This is Hansen et al’s end of year summary for 2009 (with a couple of minor edits). Update: A final version of this text is available here.
If It’s That Warm, How Come It’s So Damned Cold?
by James Hansen, Reto Ruedy, Makiko Sato, and Ken Lo
The past year, 2009, tied as the second warmest year in the 130 years of global instrumental temperature records, in the surface temperature analysis of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS). The Southern Hemisphere set a record as the warmest year for that half of the world. Global mean temperature, as shown in Figure 1a, was 0.57°C (1.0°F) warmer than climatology (the 1951-1980 base period). Southern Hemisphere mean temperature, as shown in Figure 1b, was 0.49°C (0.88°F) warmer than in the period of climatology.
Figure 1. (a) GISS analysis of global surface temperature change. Green vertical bar is estimated 95 percent confidence range (two standard deviations) for annual temperature change. (b) Hemispheric temperature change in GISS analysis. (Base period is 1951-1980. This base period is fixed consistently in GISS temperature analysis papers – see References. Base period 1961-1990 is used for comparison with published HadCRUT analyses in Figures 3 and 4.)
The global record warm year, in the period of near-global instrumental measurements (since the late 1800s), was 2005. Sometimes it is asserted that 1998 was the warmest year. The origin of this confusion is discussed below. There is a high degree of interannual (year‐to‐year) and decadal variability in both global and hemispheric temperatures. Underlying this variability, however, is a long‐term warming trend that has become strong and persistent over the past three decades. The long‐term trends are more apparent when temperature is averaged over several years. The 60‐month (5‐year) and 132 month (11‐year) running mean temperatures are shown in Figure 2 for the globe and the hemispheres. The 5‐year mean is sufficient to reduce the effect of the El Niño – La Niña cycles of tropical climate. The 11‐year mean minimizes the effect of solar variability – the brightness of the sun varies by a measurable amount over the sunspot cycle, which is typically of 10‐12 year duration.
Figure 2. 60‐month (5‐year) and 132 month (11‐year) running mean temperatures in the GISS analysis of (a) global and (b) hemispheric surface temperature change. (Base period is 1951‐1980.)
There is a contradiction between the observed continued warming trend and popular perceptions about climate trends. Frequent statements include: “There has been global cooling over the past decade.” “Global warming stopped in 1998.” “1998 is the warmest year in the record.” Such statements have been repeated so often that most of the public seems to accept them as being true. However, based on our data, such statements are not correct. The origin of this contradiction probably lies in part in differences between the GISS and HadCRUT temperature analyses (HadCRUT is the joint Hadley Centre/University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit temperature analysis). Indeed, HadCRUT finds 1998 to be the warmest year in their record. In addition, popular belief that the world is cooling is reinforced by cold weather anomalies in the United States in the summer of 2009 and cold anomalies in much of the Northern Hemisphere in December 2009. Here we first show the main reason for the difference between the GISS and HadCRUT analyses. Then we examine the 2009 regional temperature anomalies in the context of global temperatures.
Figure 3. Temperature anomalies in 1998 (left column) and 2005 (right column). Top row is GISS analysis, middle row is HadCRUT analysis, and bottom row is the GISS analysis masked to the same area and resolution as the HadCRUT analysis. [Base period is 1961‐1990.]
Figure 3 shows maps of GISS and HadCRUT 1998 and 2005 temperature anomalies relative to base period 1961‐1990 (the base period used by HadCRUT). The temperature anomalies are at a 5 degree‐by‐5 degree resolution for the GISS data to match that in the HadCRUT analysis. In the lower two maps we display the GISS data masked to the same area and resolution as the HadCRUT analysis. The “masked” GISS data let us quantify the extent to which the difference between the GISS and HadCRUT analyses is due to the data interpolation and extrapolation that occurs in the GISS analysis. The GISS analysis assigns a temperature anomaly to many gridboxes that do not contain measurement data, specifically all gridboxes located within 1200 km of one or more stations that do have defined temperature anomalies.
The rationale for this aspect of the GISS analysis is based on the fact that temperature anomaly patterns tend to be large scale. For example, if it is an unusually cold winter in New York, it is probably unusually cold in Philadelphia too. This fact suggests that it may be better to assign a temperature anomaly based on the nearest stations for a gridbox that contains no observing stations, rather than excluding that gridbox from the global analysis. Tests of this assumption are described in our papers referenced below.
Figure 4. Global surface temperature anomalies relative to 1961‐1990 base period for three cases: HadCRUT, GISS, and GISS anomalies limited to the HadCRUT area. [To obtain consistent time series for the HadCRUT and GISS global means, monthly results were averaged over regions with defined temperature anomalies within four latitude zones (90N‐25N, 25N‐Equator, Equator‐25S, 25S‐90S); the global average then weights these zones by the true area of the full zones, and the annual means are based on those monthly global means.]
Figure 4 shows time series of global temperature for the GISS and HadCRUT analyses, as well as for the GISS analysis masked to the HadCRUT data region. This figure reveals that the differences that have developed between the GISS and HadCRUT global temperatures during the past few decades are due primarily to the extension of the GISS analysis into regions that are excluded from the HadCRUT analysis. The GISS and HadCRUT results are similar during this period, when the analyses are limited to exactly the same area. The GISS analysis also finds 1998 as the warmest year, if analysis is limited to the masked area. The question then becomes: how valid are the extrapolations and interpolation in the GISS analysis? If the temperature anomaly scale is adjusted such that the global mean anomaly is zero, the patterns of warm and cool regions have realistic‐looking meteorological patterns, providing qualitative support for the data extensions. However, we would like a quantitative measure of the uncertainty in our estimate of the global temperature anomaly caused by the fact that the spatial distribution of measurements is incomplete. One way to estimate that uncertainty, or possible error, can be obtained via use of the complete time series of global surface temperature data generated by a global climate model that has been demonstrated to have realistic spatial and temporal variability of surface temperature. We can sample this data set at only the locations where measurement stations exist, use this sub‐sample of data to estimate global temperature change with the GISS analysis method, and compare the result with the “perfect” knowledge of global temperature provided by the data at all gridpoints.
| 1880‐1900 | 1900‐1950 | 1960‐2008 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Meteorological Stations | 0.2 | 0.15 | 0.08 |
| Land‐Ocean Index | 0.08 | 0.05 | 0.05 |
Table 1. Two‐sigma error estimate versus period for meteorological stations and land‐ocean index.
Table 1 shows the derived error due to incomplete coverage of stations. As expected, the error was larger at early dates when station coverage was poorer. Also the error is much larger when data are available only from meteorological stations, without ship or satellite measurements for ocean areas. In recent decades the 2‐sigma uncertainty (95 percent confidence of being within that range, ~2‐3 percent chance of being outside that range in a specific direction) has been about 0.05°C. The incomplete coverage of stations is the primary cause of uncertainty in comparing nearby years, for which the effect of more systematic errors such as urban warming is small.
Additional sources of error become important when comparing temperature anomalies separated by longer periods. The most well‐known source of long‐term error is “urban warming”, human‐made local warming caused by energy use and alterations of the natural environment. Various other errors affecting the estimates of long‐term temperature change are described comprehensively in a large number of papers by Tom Karl and his associates at the NOAA National Climate Data Center. The GISS temperature analysis corrects for urban effects by adjusting the long‐term trends of urban stations to be consistent with the trends at nearby rural stations, with urban locations identified either by population or satellite‐observed night lights. In a paper in preparation we demonstrate that the population and night light approaches yield similar results on global average. The additional error caused by factors other than incomplete spatial coverage is estimated to be of the order of 0.1°C on time scales of several decades to a century, this estimate necessarily being partly subjective. The estimated total uncertainty in global mean temperature anomaly with land and ocean data included thus is similar to the error estimate in the first line of Table 1, i.e., the error due to limited spatial coverage when only meteorological stations are included.
Now let’s consider whether we can specify a rank among the recent global annual temperatures, i.e., which year is warmest, second warmest, etc. Figure 1a shows 2009 as the second warmest year, but it is so close to 1998, 2002, 2003, 2006, and 2007 that we must declare these years as being in a virtual tie as the second warmest year. The maximum difference among these in the GISS analysis is ~0.03°C (2009 being the warmest among those years and 2006 the coolest). This range is approximately equal to our 1‐sigma uncertainty of ~0.025°C, which is the reason for stating that these five years are tied for second warmest.
The year 2005 is 0.061°C warmer than 1998 in our analysis. So how certain are we that 2005 was warmer than 1998? Given the standard deviation of ~0.025°C for the estimated error, we can estimate the probability that 1998 was warmer than 2005 as follows. The chance that 1998 is 0.025°C warmer than our estimated value is about (1 – 0.68)/2 = 0.16. The chance that 2005 is 0.025°C cooler than our estimate is also 0.16. The probability of both of these is ~0.03 (3 percent). Integrating over the tail of the distribution and accounting for the 2005‐1998 temperature difference being 0.61°C alters the estimate in opposite directions. For the moment let us just say that the chance that 1998 is warmer than 2005, given our temperature analysis, is at most no more than about 10 percent. Therefore, we can say with a reasonable degree of confidence that 2005 is the warmest year in the period of instrumental data.
Figure 5. (a) global map of December 2009 anomaly, (b) global map of Jun‐Jul‐Aug 2009 anomaly. #4 and #2 indicate that December 2009 and JJA are the 4th and 2nd warmest globally for those periods.
What about the claim that the Earth’s surface has been cooling over the past decade? That issue can be addressed with a far higher degree of confidence, because the error due to incomplete spatial coverage of measurements becomes much smaller when averaged over several years. The 2‐sigma error in the 5‐year running‐mean temperature anomaly shown in Figure 2, is about a factor of two smaller than the annual mean uncertainty, thus 0.02‐0.03°C. Given that the change of 5‐year‐mean global temperature anomaly is about 0.2°C over the past decade, we can conclude that the world has become warmer over the past decade, not cooler.
Why are some people so readily convinced of a false conclusion, that the world is really experiencing a cooling trend? That gullibility probably has a lot to do with regional short‐term temperature fluctuations, which are an order of magnitude larger than global average annual anomalies. Yet many lay people do understand the distinction between regional short‐term anomalies and global trends. For example, here is comment posted by “frogbandit” at 8:38p.m. 1/6/2010 on City Bright blog:
“I wonder about the people who use cold weather to say that the globe is cooling. It forgets that global warming has a global component and that its a trend, not an everyday thing. I hear people down in the lower 48 say its really cold this winter. That ain’t true so far up here in Alaska. Bethel, Alaska, had a brown Christmas. Here in Anchorage, the temperature today is 31[ºF]. I can’t say based on the fact Anchorage and Bethel are warm so far this winter that we have global warming. That would be a really dumb argument to think my weather pattern is being experienced even in the rest of the United States, much less globally.”
What frogbandit is saying is illustrated by the global map of temperature anomalies in December 2009 (Figure 5a). There were strong negative temperature anomalies at middle latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere, as great as ‐8°C in Siberia, averaged over the month. But the temperature anomaly in the Arctic was as great as +7°C. The cold December perhaps reaffirmed an impression gained by Americans from the unusually cool 2009 summer. There was a large region in the United States and Canada in June‐July‐August with a negative temperature anomaly greater than 1°C, the largest negative anomaly on the planet.
Figure 6. Arctic Oscillation (AO) Index. Positive values of the AO index indicate high low pressure in the polar region and thus a tendency for strong zonal winds that minimize cold air outbreaks to middle latitudes. Blue dots are monthly means and the red curve is the 60‐month (5‐year) running mean.
How do these large regional temperature anomalies stack up against an expectation of, and the reality of, global warming? How unusual are these regional negative fluctuations? Do they have any relationship to global warming? Do they contradict global warming?
It is obvious that in December 2009 there was an unusual exchange of polar and mid‐latitude air in the Northern Hemisphere. Arctic air rushed into both North America and Eurasia, and, of course, it was replaced in the polar region by air from middle latitudes. The degree to which Arctic air penetrates into middle latitudes is related to the Arctic Oscillation (AO) index, which is defined by surface atmospheric pressure patterns and is plotted in Figure 6. When the AO index is positive surface pressure is high low in the polar region. This helps the middle latitude jet stream to blow strongly and consistently from west to east, thus keeping cold Arctic air locked in the polar region. When the AO index is negative there tends to be low high pressure in the polar region, weaker zonal winds, and greater movement of frigid polar air into middle latitudes.
Figure 6 shows that December 2009 was the most extreme negative Arctic Oscillation since the 1970s. Although there were ten cases between the early 1960s and mid 1980s with an AO index more extreme than ‐2.5, there were no such extreme cases since then until last month. It is no wonder that the public has become accustomed to the absence of extreme blasts of cold air.
Figure 7. Temperature anomaly from GISS analysis and AO index from NOAA National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center. United States mean refers to the 48 contiguous states.
Figure 7 shows the AO index with greater temporal resolution for two 5‐year periods. It is obvious that there is a high degree of correlation of the AO index with temperature in the United States, with any possible lag between index and temperature anomaly less than the monthly temporal resolution. Large negative anomalies, when they occur, are usually in a winter month. Note that the January 1977 temperature anomaly, mainly located in the Eastern United States, was considerably stronger than the December 2009 anomaly. [There is nothing magic about a 31 day window that coincides with a calendar month, and it could be misleading. It may be more informative to look at a 30‐day running mean and at the Dec‐Jan‐Feb means for the AO index and temperature anomalies.]
The AO index is not so much an explanation for climate anomaly patterns as it is a simple statement of the situation. However, John (Mike) Wallace and colleagues have been able to use the AO description to aid consideration of how the patterns may change as greenhouse gases increase. A number of papers, by Wallace, David Thompson, and others, as well as by Drew Shindell and others at GISS, have pointed out that increasing carbon dioxide causes the stratosphere to cool, in turn causing on average a stronger jet stream and thus a tendency for a more positive Arctic Oscillation. Overall, Figure 6 shows a tendency in the expected sense. The AO is not the only factor that might alter the frequency of Arctic cold air outbreaks. For example, what is the effect of reduced Arctic sea ice on weather patterns? There is not enough empirical evidence since the rapid ice melt of 2007. We conclude only that December 2009 was a highly anomalous month and that its unusual AO can be described as the “cause” of the extreme December weather.
We do not find a basis for expecting frequent repeat occurrences. On the contrary. Figure 6 does show that month‐to‐month fluctuations of the AO are much larger than its long term trend. But temperature change can be caused by greenhouse gases and global warming independent of Arctic Oscillation dynamical effects.
Figure 8. Global maps 4 season temperature anomalies for ~2009. (Note that Dec is December 2008. Base period is 1951‐1980.)
Figure 9. Global maps 4 season temperature anomaly trends for period 1950‐2009.
So let’s look at recent regional temperature anomalies and temperature trends. Figure 8 shows seasonal temperature anomalies for the past year and Figure 9 shows seasonal temperature change since 1950 based on local linear trends. The temperature scales are identical in Figures 8 and 9. The outstanding characteristic in comparing these two figures is that the magnitude of the 60 year change is similar to the magnitude of seasonal anomalies. What this is telling us is that the climate dice are already strongly loaded. The perceptive person who has been around since the 1950s should be able to notice that seasonal mean temperatures are usually greater than they were in the 1950s, although there are still occasional cold seasons.
The magnitude of monthly temperature anomalies is typically 1.5 to 2 times greater than the magnitude of seasonal anomalies. So it is not yet quite so easy to see global warming if one’s figure of merit is monthly mean temperature. And, of course, daily weather fluctuations are much larger than the impact of the global warming trend. The bottom line is this: there is no global cooling trend. For the time being, until humanity brings its greenhouse gas emissions under control, we can expect each decade to be warmer than the preceding one. Weather fluctuations certainly exceed local temperature changes over the past half century. But the perceptive person should be able to see that climate is warming on decadal time scales.
This information needs to be combined with the conclusion that global warming of 1‐2°C has enormous implications for humanity. But that discussion is beyond the scope of this note.
References:
Hansen, J.E., and S. Lebedeff, 1987: Global trends of measured surface air temperature. J. Geophys. Res., 92, 13345‐13372.
Hansen, J., R. Ruedy, J. Glascoe, and Mki. Sato, 1999: GISS analysis of surface temperature change. J. Geophys. Res., 104, 30997‐31022.
Hansen, J.E., R. Ruedy, Mki. Sato, M. Imhoff, W. Lawrence, D. Easterling, T. Peterson, and T. Karl, 2001: A closer look at United States and global surface temperature change. J. Geophys. Res., 106, 23947‐23963.
Hansen, J., Mki. Sato, R. Ruedy, K. Lo, D.W. Lea, and M. Medina‐Elizade, 2006: Global temperature change. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., 103, 14288‐14293.
(I will also point out that there are zero historical examples of humans embracing a behavior which is more costly and less efficient than their current behaviors, especially when those behaviors are essential to their lives.)
“That was my point. The article I cited in 682 plausibly supports both of our positions”
How can it when you assert “That is nonsense.” to my position?
Were you caught out and now backpeddaling for all your worth to hide it?
There have been effects that have reduced wheat production.
They are absolutely known because farmers KNOW how their crops respond to changes in environment and we KNOW from measurements what those changes have been.
Likewise we KNOW that CO2 has an effect on the climate and that without this effect the climate as it had been would have seen a weather record significantly different in toto to the one seen in the actual records.
These changes are KNOWN to reduce wheat yields and many other staple crops worldwide.
Unless the farmers are in on “teh conspirasy” too…
“You missed the point”
So what was the point, or did you push that out there to leave the lingering smell of your own superiority out there without the terrible burden of showing it?
Because your snideness didn’t answer the question: how are farmers going to plant more of it?
Seems like you’re avoiding the point.
Completely: #690
“PS why didn’t you stay on subject? 11 years isn’t climate.”
Completely, you might want to mention that to Dr. Hansen when he compares individual years like 98 and 05. And also when he speaks about the warmest decade on record.
#682, Don, I’d sincerely hope farmers are doing all they can to adapt.
However, this doesn’t reduce the need to mitigate GW one iota. In fact, people, including farmers, who put sincere efforts at reducing their GHG emissions through energy/resource efficiency/conservation and alt energy have found (often to their surprise, as with me) that they are saving money without lowering living standards or productivity.
For instance 3M’s 3P program — Pollution Prevention Pays. They were able to reduce pollution substantially AND save $millions doing so. The CEO had simply asked all the employees (from engineers to assembly line workers) to look for ways to reduce that wouldn’t cost them too much, so as to meet regs, and when they did, they came up with with all these money-savers. When they CEO asked why they hadn’t come up with the money-savers before, they said it wasn’t put to them that way.
Then there is DOW’s WRAP – Waste Reduction Always Pays.
Now these companies are far from squeaky clean, and they could probably find even more environmental money-savers, but if they can do it, why can’t others?
I suggest everyone in America give it the ole American try, and then we might really be world leaders.
Let’s not wimp out.
Re; 692 Don Shor says:
“You missed the point. But never mind.”
Global warming is much more likely to negatively influence food production than some of y’all are letting on with your endless quibbling.
High temperatures can wipe out cereal and vegetable crops as well as livestock. Droughts are devastating. So are floods. Floods coming after droughts are ruinous. As these sorts of events become more commonplace, who’s going to take a chance on a good year?
It’s incredible that the US Farm Bureau has come out against action to attenuate climate change.
“Scientists Request Meeting with American Farm Bureau President to Discuss Group’s ‘Inaccurate’ Stance on Climate Change”
http://www.ucsusa.org/news/press_release/scientists-letter-to-farm-bureau-0331.html
January 7, 2010
Michigan to Face More Heat Waves, Flooding, and Reduced Crop Yields with Unchecked Climate Change
http://www.ucsusa.org/news/press_release/michigan-climate-impacts-0273.html
September 9, 2009
Congress Considering Legislation that Could Help Michigan and the Rest of the Nation Avoid Worst Consequences of Climate Change
CHICAGO (Sept. 9, 2009) — If the United States does not significantly curb heat-trapping emissions, global warming will seriously damage Michigan’s climate and economy, according to a new peer-reviewed report released today by the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS).
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/impacts/climate-change-midwest.html
The report found that a combination of clean energy policies—such as those currently under consideration by the U.S. Senate—would help blunt the extent and severity of global warming in Michigan and across the country.
“The Midwest climate is already changing. Over the past 50 years, we’ve seen higher average annual temperatures, more frequent downpours, longer growing seasons, and fewer cold snaps,” said Katharine Hayhoe, an atmospheric scientist at Texas Tech University and a co-author of the report. “The likely changes documented in this report are sobering. The good news is that we can avoid the worst of them if we substantially cut global warming emissions and start doing it now.”
[…]
Taking a lesson from denialists and how some arrive at conclusions I’m able to report that Richard Steckis has conceded the point that ocean acidification is a serious problem. After all, if he had not I’m sure he’d be all gang-busters to set the record straight by now.
Last week I offered Mr Steckis 2 simple ways he could settle the debate.
1. “…how about categorizing all forms of sea life as its effected by increasing concentrations of CO2 in the ocean?”
I made it easier since he’s such a busy guy:
2. “If he wants to prove he’s right, prove that ocean acidification is a crock, then he could do an _inventory_ of the ocean’s animal and plant taxa by genus and species. He could classify them by degree of impact of CO2 poisoning for various life stages and various carbonic acid concentrations.
This would settle it.”
Both non-starters I’m afraid. I guess we are just supposed to take his word for it since he actually once studied and all.
Richard replied to comment #564 with #604 to dshogaza, writing, “Unlike you, I have a peer-reviewed publication record as both primary and co-author. For your information I was studying toward my Ph.D….
What a timely subject for a wonderful and informative dissertation, “Ocean Acidification: Nothing to Worry About Here. Move On.”
But what answer hear we? #603 “When all else fails good old Ray resorts to the Ad-Hom attack. You are so predictable.”
And so too has Mr Steckis become predictable – hardly interested in adding anything meaningful to the discussion, or defending his grasp of reality but rather more interested in being accusatory and argumentative for its own sake.
So it is with these denialists, the only time they’re useful is when they go out on a limb with a saw.
Pete Best – that was an earthquake that had nothing to do with weather or climate.
For Jim Hansen and Mark Serreze:
The riddle is growing. Can’t understand how global land temp is the exact middle of the NH and SH values when land distribution is wholly not equal for what’s below and above the equator (CRUTEMP). Same thing for SST anomalies as published by NOAA:
November 2009
NH 0.5330C+
SH 0.5323C+
GL 0.5241C+
A dumb average would be 0.5327C+
December 2009
NH 0.5516C+
SH 0.5448C+
GL 0.5398C+
Another dumb average would be 0.5482C+
I’m sure there a simple explanation (a slap of the forehead one), but the global SST value, albeit something the tip of my nose might not feel, outside the NH and SH SSTs is well, strange the least. The Annual figure is also, hmmm suspect, if one weights the total ocean/sea surface of the two halves on our sphere.
PS: Of course it could be the wrong data sets were loaded. I’m getting them from here: ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/anomalies/
“703
Tilo Reber says:
28 January 2010 at 10:41 AM
Completely: #690
“PS why didn’t you stay on subject? 11 years isn’t climate.”
Completely, you might want to mention that to Dr. Hansen when he compares individual years like 98 and 05.”
Hansen doesn’t call them climate.
So why should I tell him something that he knows and has never countered with a statement to the contrary?
“The riddle is growing. Can’t understand how global land temp is the exact middle of the NH and SH values when land distribution is wholly not equal”
Here’s why:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemisphere
Half a sphere.
“701
Walt Bennett says:
28 January 2010 at 12:10 AM
(I will also point out that there are zero historical examples of humans embracing a behavior which is more costly and less efficient than their current behaviors”
In fact, the use of agribusiness chemicals HAS caused a farming process that is more expensive and less efficient.
In the northern parts of India and in the forested areas of Zaire the old ways had the farmers being given mechanical harvesters and agribusiness chemicals. The machines broke down and they don’t have the parts, training or money to fix them. The chemicals are sold and the price fixed from foreign needs, not theirs. It also ignored any local knowledge on how to farm.
But as a change they tried recently to use local knowledge, no chemicals and animal/human power. The yields actually increased.
Seems like the first years after chemical treatment increased yields greatly but each year you needed more chemicals for the same effect. These farmers were too poor but “had” to use chemicals because they were told that yields would drop even more if they stopped.
They lost the cost of exporting money they needed to a foreign company and increased yields.
They don’t have thousand-acre farms to work, so mechanisation to reduce human effort isn’t needed and human effort is cheap and renewable. They tend to fix themselves.
So your assertion is wrong.
Not to mention that weaning off fossil fuels is not shown to result in a less efficient or more expensive life or even a reduction in living. In fact, living conditions may increase, much like the clean air acts “cost” some money but saved more in lives and illnesses AND made life better for the people in the cities.
RS: “If a methane pulse is to occur and it will some time in the future, it will not be because of us but will occur through a natural mechanism.”
Yes, the natural heating of the oceans causing the breakup of the conditional stability of the methane clathrates.
That heating being the natural result of increasing CO2.
That increase in CO2 being the natural result of burning trillions of tons of fossil fuels.
The burning of trillions of tons of fossil fuels being a natural result of us burning them.
But we don’t naturally burn fossil fuels.
So the methane clathrates are a result of our unnatural actions.
Tilo Dr. Hansen was responding to bullsh*t, not initiating a topic. As I’m doing now.
From the GISS press release:
In total, average global temperatures have increased by about 0.8°C (1.5°F) since 1880.
“That’s the important number to keep in mind,” said Gavin Schmidt, another GISS climatologist.
But then, you’ve all this before, haven’t you?
Re: #712
You failed to address mass human behavior, and your last paragraph utterly ignored the intermediate cost factor.
I need some answer on this. Received a chain email with photos of ribboned Antarctic icebergs, claiming they formed because 2008 was the coldest year (didn’t specify since when). But I need give some better background picture (like “It was cold in Antarctic that year bec…,” or “It was cold in Antarctic, but it was above normal elsewhere in ____ & ____”)
Here is the caption:
Steckis says of the proposed mechanism for the onset of the PETM:
“Interesting that you use the word putative which means supposed. In other words you are saying that it is not the known mechanism for PETM but a theoretical mechanism.”
Ah, the old “It’s only a theory,” gambit. You sure you haven’t been hanging out over at Answers in Genesis? I suppose the PETM could have been the result of some Martian heat ray and they dumped all that methane into the atmosphere just to throw us off, huh? Thanks, Richard, but I’ll take the best scientific explanation and leave science fiction to you.
Steckis then says “If a methane pulse is to occur and it will some time in the future, it will not be because of us but will occur through a natural mechanism.”
Wow, Richard, such certainty. I’m sure you have some dazzling analysis or peer-reviewed research to back it up. Why not share it?
CFU 711, you’re such a smart cookie… Lets try again for you: If Australia’s northern 2rds have a 1C anomaly and the southern 1rd has a 0.5C anomaly… how much would the combined anomaly be?
“and your last paragraph utterly ignored the intermediate cost factor.”
The immediate cost of what?
In fact, why do people become millionaires when you can’t spend it in your lifetime?
It can’t be the immediate benefit.
In fact all the rhetoric is about how they MUST be allowed to let thier heirs inherit.
Funny how it’s all about the kids when they’re dead at the time and can’t spend a nickel.
So if people are worried about what their children inherit, how about the immense cost of not saving now?
After all, buying a house on a mort gage is a huge IMMEDIATE cost, but in the long term it’s cheaper than renting. And your children inherit a house.
Or you could go millions in debt and leave your children with crushing debt to deal with.
You would propose that it’s fine to leave the next generation with a debt because it’s cheaper for you to live a deficit life.
RE #706, the mid-summer heat would be enough (even without the floods and droughts — which would be the final nails in the crop coffins) to pretty much do in Midwestern agriculture once GW really starts kicking in (even just with what’s in the pipes — the 2.4 C warming see Ramanathan & Feng, 2008 below)
This is just a small scenario of what might happen. I’m in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, latitude 26.3 N. There are 2 planting seasons — in the Sept/Oct and in late Jan-Feb-Mar. It’s just too hot for things to grow (or grow well) in summer; the goal is just to keep the plants alive with irrigation water. And there isn’t as much sun in the winter (and the temps do get down a bit), so things don’t grow well in winter either; the goal is just to keep them alive. This year it was disaster with a few freezing days due to this strongly negative Arctic oscillation anomaly; pretty much did in our newly planted vegetable garden, except for the spinach (luckily my husband kept some potted plantlings in the garage and planted them a couple of weeks ago, so we’ll see).
Imagine up North in the Midwest once the warming (heating) really kicks in by around 2050, where there is even less sun in winter, and longer days in summer with the heat and sun mid-summer wreaking havoc on the hottest days. I guess farmers could get some massive umbrella-tarps and draw out even more water from the Ogallala aquifer to keep a fine mist on the crops…that would be an adaption to GW.
_________
Ramanathan, V., and Y. Feng. 2008. “On Avoiding Dangerous Anthropogenic Interference with the Climate System: Formidable Challenges Ahead.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 105.38: 14245-14250. http://www.pnas.org/content/105/38/14245.full
Walt Bennett,
I understand that you are eager to get on with the risk mitigation phase of the climate crisis. I agree that it is well past time for that. However, there are still 3 important obstacles to effective risk mitigation for climate. The first is that any mitigation strategy must be based on the science as best we understand it–and there is still a large number of people who do not understand the science and so reject it.
The second obstacle is more fundamental: We cannot mitigate until we can bound the risk at some reasonable confidence level. However, the risk escalates extremely rapidly with increasing temperature, and the temperature increase we can expect depends on a lot of things we do not know–
1)a usable upper bound for climate sensitivity (the current bound of the 90% confidence interval of 4.5 degrees per doubling gives pretty severe consequences for even 3x preindustrial CO2)
2)how much CO2 we will emit in the future (current known reserves of major fossil fuel sources could take us well over 1000 ppmv)
3)possible tipping points that would release large amounts of ghgs
The third problem is that mechanisms proposed for mitigation are precisely those areas of climate where we have the least understanding. This makes it extremely difficult to validate their effectiveness and to anticipate and mitigate undesirable side effects (e.g. increased ocean acidification).
Since we cannot at present bound the risk, the only responsible risk mitigation strategy is risk avoidance–and that means limiting CO2 emissions to the extent possible while we work to bound risk better and develop and validate effective mitigations.
Re #716
Lynn the photos are genuine and are all over the web, they have nothing to do with 2008 being a cold winter however. They have been accompanied in emails with images purporting to show waves freezing instantly in mid air which has been debunked in many places!
See here for example: http://www.inhabitots.com/2009/10/10/behold-natures-art-striped-icebergs-and-frozen-waves-of-antarctica/
Lynn – might point out that those icebergs weren’t created in one year [although the e-mail originated in spring ’08, but are the result of multiyear processes, nor are oddly colored ones unique to 2008 or “the coldest winter” colored bergs
Lynn, you might want to counter that nonsense by mentioning a) how it takes hundreds, even thousands of years for glacial ice or floating ice shelves to form, and b) that Antarctica (and Greenland) is losing huge ice shelves due to catastrophic collapse from warming temperatures.
Those ice shelves were often thousands of years old. That’s how long it will take to replace them, too.
Re: 707
4TimesAYear says:
29 January 2010
Pete Best – that was an earthquake that had nothing to do with weather or climate.
Not so fast…
Fire and Ice: Melting Glaciers Trigger Earthquakes, Tsunamis and Volcanos
http://environment.about.com/od/globalwarming/a/earthquakes.htm
Geologists Say Global Warming Expected to Cause Many New Seismic Events
By Larry West,
Melting Ice Sheets Can Cause Earthquakes, Study Finds
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/03/080314-warming-quakes.html
Mason Inman
for National Geographic News
March 14, 2008
Climate change could cause earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, scientists say
http://www.climateemergency.org/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=44&Itemid=110
Canadian Press
By: DENNIS BUECKERT
July 4, 2006
Re: 716 Lynn Vincentnathan says:
29 January 2010
I need some answer on this. Received a chain email with photos of ribboned Antarctic icebergs…”
Fascinating. The images depict different things that happen to icebergs.
I was on the Antarctic Peninsula in January 2009 and saw nothing
like these incredibly beautiful images.
See:
http://www.polarconservation.org/news/pco-news-articles/iceberg-in-rainbow-colours
&
http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/stripedicebergs.asp#photo2
&
http://www.francescjosep.net/tag/curiosa/
&
http://www.inhabitots.com/2009/10/10/behold-natures-art-striped-icebergs-and-frozen-waves-of-antarctica/
&
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1582098/Rainbow-iceberg-in-the-Antarctic.html
&
http://trance.nu/v4/forum/viewtopic.php?t=151899
image:
http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2008/03_03/Berg2BAR1703_800x545.jpg
from:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-536928/Revealed-The-Antarctic-iceberg-looks-like-giant-humbug.html
Commentary:
http://www.hoax-slayer.com/striped-icebergs.shtml
716: Interesting, Lynn. That picture is on snopes.com, but it doesn’t have anything to do with “the coldest winter.” They’d probably be interested in this mutation of the email.
Richard Steckis says: 27 January 2010 at 8:53 PM
“If a methane pulse is to occur and it will some time in the future, it will not be because of us but will occur through a natural mechanism.”
Just because. Bank on it.
Lynn #716, scroll down to “Global highlights” at
http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2008/20080313_coolest.html
> zero historical examples of humans embracing a behavior which is more
> costly and less efficient than their current behaviors, especially when
> those behaviors are essential to their lives
Your education omitted altruism?
Ever heard of Leningrad?
“During the terrible starvation of the siege …. One of his assistants even died of starvation … surrounded by 200,000 types of plant seed, most of them edible. …”
http://www.inyourpocket.com/russia/st-petersburg/The-Siege-of-Leningrad-70962f?more=1
Re: #716
I’m sure you would agree that it makes sense that when an ice sheet breaks up it forms more icebergs. Therefore, one stage of warming in the Antarctic is just such an effect: Ice sheets shatter, creating many icebergs.
I’m sure you’ll find that to be the actual explanation. Coastal regions of the Antarctic are among the fastest warming on the planet.
re #715 and you’ve merely stated that mass human behaviour is the way you say it is.
If it were true, please explain Live Aid and the more recent work in Haiti.
@Lynn #716 – Are these the photographs?
http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/antarcticwave.asp
If so, they were taken in 2002. I’ve read there is an email doing the rounds again along the lines you’ve quoted.
Regarding the temperature in Antarctica – I don’t know if 2008 was an especially cold year down there or not. You can check the following link for some Australian stations:
http://www.bom.gov.au/weather/ant/
@Lynn Vincentnathan”
http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/stripedicebergs.asp
Flagged as true. The article is verbatim, except without the last line in bold.It is an actual natural phenomenon, but is not evidence related to a colder than average winter.
The snopes article links to this research site with more breath-taking photos and interesting facts. http://www.aad.gov.au/default.asp?casid=37157
> STRIPED ICEBERGS …
> Received a chain email …
http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/antarcticwave.asp
Snopes has the explanation of the pictures, description of the false claims attached to them in the hoax chain email, and a link to the origina images.
> STRIPED ICEBERGS
Here’s how I looked that up:
http://www.google.com/search?q=Brown%2C+black+and+yellow+lines+are+caused+by+sediment%2C+picked+up+when+the+ice+sheet+grinds+downhill+towards+the+sea.++These+pictures+are+available+because+2008+has+been+the+coldest+winter
What’s the question, Lynn? The causation claimed seems like a total non sequitur. (Icebergs form all the time, after all, not just in 2008. And how do we “know” when these bergs calved, anyway?)
Looks as if Tilo R has moved his musings on Hansen’s paper to WUWT, where the level of adulation for him probably exceeds that here. (Haven’t read his article or the comments it’s elicited, just guessing!)
Good update on Pine Island in a recent topic at AccuWeather:
http://global-warming.accuweather.com/2010/01/whats_the_deal_with_antarctica_1.html
(usual septic comments of course)
Thanks to you all re the striped icebergs. Before responses came in (I needed to nip it in the bud), I wrote my friend:
& I attached a sheet of maps from:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=36699
& http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=42392
After reading your helpful comments, I sent her another email with some of their insights in it.
I’ve also written to Snopes that this is a meme — the photos are true and beautiful, but the message with some emails (that they are due to 2008 being the coldest) are false. People send them bec they are beautiful, along with the implicit climate denialist message.
Re: #721
Ray,
Risk-avoidance is a dead letter.
Surely you realize that.
Re: #732
Examples of people gathering to hear music is supposed to convince me that the mass of humanity will submit to less energy at greater cost?
My previous comment was not posted, because the system has detected it as spam message.
The comment was that you should check the fact about frozen Niagara in 1911 (Figure 1 in the pdf version). This statement about frozen Niagara seems to be incorrect. If you let me post here links to other web sites, I’ll give references to discussion of this problem.
Niagara Falls stopped in March 1848. However it was related not with anomalously low temperature, but with an ice dam on Lake Eri!
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/get-file.php?report=national&image=timeseries02&byear=2009&bmonth=10&year=2009&month=10&ext=gif&id=110-00
As a non-climate scientist, I’m still intrigued by datasets/graphs like this one. I believe that the data for Nov and Dec show the same ‘up and down’ temperatures over a century or so? Thanks for any help ?
“I believe that the data for Nov and Dec show the same ‘up and down’ temperatures over a century or so?”
Yes, because we still have weather, Bill.
What? Did you expect the line to straighten out like pulling on a wrinkled sheet or something???
re Walt: Of course I don’t expect YOU to believe that. Because you hate other people if they get in your way and to justify it you project that onto everyone else so that it’s “everybody else does it, so why not me?”-justified.
Walt says, “Risk-avoidance is a dead letter.”
In saying this, you are saying that we cannot carry out proper risk management strategy. And since risk avoidance is the only viable strategy at this point, you are in effect saying nothing can be done. I do not accept this.
At the very least, we have to reduce consumption to buy time for coming up with geoengineering and other risk reductions strategies.
Or perhaps if you know of any viable strategies, you could share them.
Bill (744), keep in mind that the contiguous US only accounts for about 1.5% of the global surface area and the warming isn’t distributed evenly around the planet. Perhaps this chart from the same site you linked too will help:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/img/climate/research/global-jan-dec-error-bar-pg.gif
Thanks for the explanation, thats clearer for me. Can I conclude that the contiguous USA has not warmed on average,over the last 100+ years, but the ocean has ?
Paul Klemencic (183): Yes, indeed: Last month was the hottest January globally in 30 years of UAH satellite measurements: http://bit.ly/HotJan. Anomaly +0.72 C