Has the warming trend slowed in the 2000s? Yes and no.
The rate of global warming has been the subject of much skepticism among the refudiater set. A good deal of that skepticism has been directed at the claim that there's been little to no warming since the end of the last millennium, with the main argument being that the warming trends found in countless studies were artifacts of siting, measurement and/or analytical errors.
A red herring? Almost certainly, given the abundance of independent evidence of a globally warming world -- the melting of glaciers and permafrost, the shrinking of Arctic sea ice in extent and volume (see also here), earlier bud breaks in spring, to name a few.
Nevertheless, the objections kept coming until a study by none other than a climate skeptic -- the temperature trend analysis by the Richard Muller-led Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST) project put the kibosh on them. The BEST team found a 1.8-degree Fahrenheit (1-degree Celsius) rise in land temps since 1950, pretty much in line with previous investigators.
OK, some skeptics say, the latter half of the 20th century saw warming, but so far the 21st century has not. Indeed, a cursory look at the global temperature record does not show any evidence of an increase. So what gives? Has the age of global warming come to a screeching halt? Are we even headed for global cooling? When one's talking about the future, it is a shaky business to say "never" or "no way." So I'll just say, "Not likely." Here's why.
 (Credit: NASA Earth Observatory/Robert Simmon) |
First of all, within the 20th century temperature record there are a number of decade-long periods when warming stalled only to start up again. The current temperature stasis is likely to be of the same ilk.
Moreover, lots of things can influence global temperatures. There are greenhouse gases, yes, but there are also solar variations, volcanic eruptions and the El Niño-La Niña oscillation. All of these can influence the year-to-year variations in global temperatures -- conceivably dampening or even at times canceling the warming from greenhouse gases while enhancing it at other times. A number of recent climate-model studies have provided cogent arguments that the current warming stasis can in fact be explained by the transient influence of other factors.
Last week, in a paper published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, Grant Foster of Tempo Analytics and Stefan Rahmstorf of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research took a different tack. The authors used statistical methods rather than modeling to tease out the impacts from factors that contribute to shorter-term variability for five of the most-used temperature records. These records include three surface temperature records (from NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies [GISS], NOAA's National Climatic Data Center [NCDC], and the UK Met Office Hadley Center and the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia [HadCRU]) and two lower troposphere satellite records (from Remote Sensing Systems in California [RSS] and the University of Alabama, Huntsville [UAH]).
Focusing on 1979 to 2010 -- the period of overlap for all five records -- the authors used statistical methods, along with data on the temporal variations in the El Niño-La Niña oscillations, solar variations, and volcanic eruptions, to quantify and remove that part of the temperature signal caused by each of those factors. The remaining temperature trend, they reasoned, is at least in part, and almost certainly in large part, due to the monotonically increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases. Interestingly enough, once the trio of factors is removed, there is agreement between all five records: steady warming over the whole period, the 2000s included -- with "the two hottest years" being the most recent: 2009 and 2010.
In other words, once the influences of shorter-term natural variability are stripped away, there is no evidence that the warming trend has slowed at all.
This study goes hand in hand with a journal paper by Markus Huber and Reto Knutti of ETH Zurich from last week's edition of Nature Geoscience, which used modeling to tease out the relative contribution of natural climate variability from human drivers of climate. Their analysis found that it is "extremely likely" that 74 percent of the warming experienced since 1950 is anthropogenic in origin.
Two very interesting papers. Will they put the kibosh on refudiater predictions of imminent global cooling? As I said before, when it comes to the future, never say "never," but "not likely" seems a good bet.
Crossposted with TheGreenGrok
Follow Bill Chameides on Twitter: www.twitter.com/TheGreenGrok
Ken Lay of Enron realized they could reap big bucks if a CO2 Cap and Trade system were devised(Enron was already making money from Californias sulpher C&T program)
Ken Lay was Al Gores buddy.
They brought us Kyoto and Climate research legislation pouring over $100 Billion since its inception into research.
No money if you are a denier.#100 billion if you can prove global warming.
Id take the money too.
If you dont know that ,then ask yourself how you could be so ignorant ,when you thought you were knowledgeable about global warming.
Im a leftist BTW.
Dr. Spencer is an entirely tireless defender of the taxpayers who are paying him to do something else entirely! His results are always certifiable; they not only conform to Biblical certainty, they are absolutely as unquestionable as Fundanomics itself.
For those interested in real fiction, rendered in fanciful dialectic, rush right over to this web site. Please. Tell them you saw my picture and you will get a discount on a BEST coffee mug!
Granted, Dr. Spencer's award was won for his famous, several-years-long global temperature analyses that was later infamously found by independent scientists to have several fundamental errors and thus needed a massive correction, but that too was wonderful.
Science marches forward, despite the wonderful Dr. Roy Spencer's ongoing and colossal climate science errors, and despite Spencer's pre-determined religious belief that per the Bible God will protect us from global warming. Amongst Dr. Spencer's followers this is known as the Wonderful News.
http://www.opticsinfobase.org/abstract.cfm?URI=josa-43-11-1037
http://www.opticsinfobase.org/abstract.cfm?URI=ao-1-6-759
http://www.stormingmedia.us/49/4989/0498907.html
Human CO2 emissions upset the natural balance of the carbon cycle. Man-made CO2 in the atmosphere has increased by a third since the pre-industrial era, creating an artificial forcing of global temperatures which is warming the planet. While fossil-fuel derived CO2 is a very small component of the global carbon cycle, the extra CO2 is cumulative because the natural carbon exchange cannot absorb all the additional CO2.
As well there is plenty of credible evidence to prove that temperatures have and are continuing to be affected by CO2 levels.
http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2011/20110118_MilankovicPaper.pdf
And no. What's happening now is not within normal variations.
http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=11676&page=R1
has global warming been called off?
Dear Orkneygal,
Isn't prominent global warming "skeptic" Dr. Robert M "Bob" Carter committing de facto global warming fraud by misrepresenting increasing global temperature trend lines as flat?*
Isn't that like a climate science scam, a global warming hoax, a blatant and indefensible lie?
Also:
You have indicated that you live in New Zealand - what relationship do you have with Bob Carter's "skeptical" New Zealand Climate Science Coalition (NZCSC), if any?
Please finally answer these questions instead of continuing to run away from them - thank you.
[ Que: continued silence from "truth seeker" Orkneygal with respect to Bob Carter's de facto global warming fraud and her relationship to Bob Carter's global warming "skeptic" organization the NZCSC. ]
------------------
* http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2011/07/bob_carters_trend_lines.php
gallon: "Spencer knowingly draws false trend lines through data."
Another prominent global warming "skeptic" -- Dr. Robert M. "Bob" Carter -- also puts false trend lines through the exact same dataset:
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2011/07/bob_carters_trend_lines.php
And unlike Dr. Spencer, Dr. Carter didn't add the caveat that his false trend lines are "for entertainment purposes only."
Global warming fraud, anyone?
Funny too how Dr. Spencer and Dr. Carter's fake trend lines over the exact same dataset are not the same fake trend lines - their respective fake trend lines in fact look nothing like each other. Both of their fake trend lines however serve to obfuscate the fact that that the real trend line for that dataset shows a real and significant global warming trend.
There's a pattern here - a pattern of prominent global warming "skeptics" trying to Hide The Incline.
Those interested in real science, from real scientific instruments should note that the AMSR-E instrument failed in early October 2011 and a replacement will not be available until next year.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/12/15/uah-gloabl-temp-holding-steady-in-november/
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/18/science/earth/18CLIM.html
http://www.skepticalscience.com/satellite-measurements-warming-troposphere.htm
Roy Spencer have been repeatedly debunked by other climate scientists.
http://bbickmore.wordpress.com/2011/02/25/roy-spencers-great-blunder-part-1/
http://profmandia.wordpress.com/2011/08/03/spencer-braswell-2011-proof-that-global-warming-is-exaggerated-or-just-bad-science/
Roy Spencer, is a Board member of Cornwall Alliance for Stewardsip of Creation, which preaches that per the Bible God will protect us from global warming:
-----------------------
The world is in the grip of an idea: that burning fossil fuels... is causing global warming that will be so dangerous that we must stop it by reducing our use...
We believe that idea... fails the tests of theology... with a worldview of the Earth and its climate system contrary to that taught in the Bible...
God’s wisdom, power, and faithfulness justify confidence that Earth’s ecosystems are robust and will, by God’s providence, accomplish the purposes He set for them.
------------------------
http://www.cornwallalliance.org/docs/a-renewed-call-to-truth-prudence-and-protection-of-the-poor.pdf
Roy Spencer is a creationist.
http://theevolutioncrisis.org.uk/testimony2.php
Roy Spencer's repeated failures to have climate science conform to his fundamentalist religious beliefs notwithstanding, global warming science deniers parrot what Roy Spencer says with zero skepticism.
That's almost as amusing as climate science "skeptics" taking everything from Roy "God Says He'll Protect Us From Global Warming" Spencer seriously and without real skeptiscm.
If this is an artifact of global warming - I confess I'm enjoying it! I know I should I feel guilty - but every time I look in my garden I confess, I enjoy seeing those plants thrive! Sometimes I dream of being able to plant climbing Jasmine in my garden (which would be a really horrible thing for the planet, as it would take a plant zone shift of six zones to make that happen.) But honesty compels me to say that sometimes when I think of global warming, my eyes drift across the flower beds, and I wonder... oh the possibilities!
http://www.nrdc.org/oceans/acidification/files/NRDC-OceanAcidFSWeb.pdf
http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/2009/02/02/ocean_acidification/
http://ocean.nationalgeographic.com/ocean/critical-issues-ocean-acidification/
http://www.psp.wa.gov/downloads/SP2009/0509/12b_doney_ann_rev_proof.pdf
http://www.economist.com/node/16479264
2) Also, the rest of that article is meaningless... "Obama is behind the UK police executing a search warrant in the UK for a crime that didn't happen in the States!"...
The authorities are finally getting serious about investigating who illegally hacked the CRU's email servers?
Oh... My... God...
About firkin time.
Neocons bear the primary responsibility.
You are the single greatest driving force behind AGW and fought a long and vicious battle against the rest of us accepting that CO2 emissions are to blame.
QUIT
I also blame you for the extensive deforestation of the Amazon Basin. I don't know how much you were involved at first, but you did see innocent people the tools and chemicals the used.
Since then, you have raked in the money while one of the world primary areas for removing CO2 from the atmosphere. I don't know how much money you have already made, but that needs to stop as soon as possible.
I don't know how long it will take to replace the forests - I do know that there has been severe erosion and loss of essential nutrients.
How many tons of fertilizer will be needed is incalculable so far as I'm concerned.
Another severe problem with the increased CO2 in our atmosphere is that when you mix CO2 with water, you get carbolic acid. It at away the limestone beneath the earth and is capable of eating away the very thing calcium shells of krill and creatures like them.
What will happen when the fish that prey on krill are starving and no longer can support them.
They will die, and the world will lose the largest remaining source of protein available today.
What will we do then?
Stop, or you may kill us all.
Seems your tinfoil hat missed the signals on how that 'green initiative' starved people.
But on the flip side, there is plenty of unused land in Africa alone to farm enough food for biofuels and the population of the planet...
I don't see that word anywhere.
Why don't all of you cool down and cut out the ludicrous, self-damaging conflict you're currently engaged in.
I'm a liberal so I'll start with the econuts first.
You have both the heroes of GreenPeace and the cowards who once drove spikes into trees to intimidate and possibly harm innocent workers.
You are also the fools who have held back the expansion of nuclear factilities designed to produce electricity. Because you have, your enemies have used your head-in-the sand tactics to make the entire industry less safe.
If we have our generations version of Chernobyl or Three Mile Island, you will bear part of the responsibility.
Robert Heinlein once wrote that ecologist of you ilk were so fanatic because they hate mankind.
Do you? Do you hate your children, your allies, or the innocent?
If you don't, stop this foolishness now, not later.
Any group that perpetuates this type of activity other than Green Peace needs to be broken up.
Any person who perpetuates needs to be branded as a traitor to humanity who attempting to commit genocide and hounded until they are more reasonable.
This global warming thing will turn into a severe environmental problem of unprecedented scope. A fair number of people concerned with this are actually very open to nuclear power as a "bridge" to a more sustainable future (even the nuclear fuel won't last forever), because the consequences of continued mass use of fossil fuels are so potentially devastating.
And so on.
A vast minority of people are against Nuclear power. If you're against nuclear power you're most likely against it for misguided beliefs on "human safety", which has nothing to do with the environment.
"All people concerned with global warming are Environmentalists, some environmentalists are against nuclear power or drove spikes into trees, therefore all everyone concerned with global warming also put spikes in trees and are against nuclear power" - CBasilJr
My one point of contention is that I think it can be shown that the 'bridge' fuel will last effectively forever. I don't want to change the topic here though.
Not everyone is playing along with the more extreme and less reasonable 'solutions'.
I think you go a little overboard here, but I get that you're angry. I hope you can turn that into positive and productive action.
I am a Green, but I also realize that extremism is not good because it tends to ignore the best interests of all of us.
I'm actually more frustrated than angry, especially with the NRC's current woeful job at controlling an industry which affects all of us.
I try, but as a retired vet with serious physical problems, my ability to get out and take an active part is limited.
I can write pretty well, and I'd someday like to write some of the articles we see here on HP.
Much better than this paper:
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2008JD011637.shtml
by McLean, de Freitas, and Carter, 2009. They remove the long term signal using filters, and then claimed there was no long term signal, because they couldn't see it any more. Dumb - as you'd expect from deniers.
Believers in the sanctity of the status quo will cite irrelevant references to pre-mammalian eras.
They will cite the latest anecdote meme, in this case, the Chinese citrus orchards story. Never mind the isotope record, or the foram and other records from the rest of the planet, the evidence of Neolithic artifacts falling out of glaciers this year. That’s funny.. how come they didn’t fall out during the medieval warm period if it was so darned warm? Never mind the melting glaciers, melting… heck they are disappearing from Glacier national park! Never mind the gravitometer readings over Antarctica and Greenland showing ice loss. Never mind the record low ice volumes in the Arctic.
To the authoritarian mind focused on an ideological belief, I am not sure what kind of wakeup call is capable of penetrating to their sense of discovery and getting them to hear you say “Hey! Don’t be afraid to contemplate this theory! It won’t hurt you to just examine it and try it on for fit! You can take it off it you don’t like it! Don’t be scared!”
http://neuropolitics.org/
Thanks Anthro.