Before And After The Temperature Standstill
- Date: 11/06/2013 Dr David Whitehouse
The absence of any significant change in the global annual average temperature over the past 16 years has become one of the most discussed topics in climate science. It has certainly focused the debate about the relative importance of greenhouse gas forcing of the climate versus natural variability.
In all this discussion what happened to global temperature immediately before the standstill is often neglected. Many assume that since the recent warming period commenced – about 1980 – global temperature rose until 1998 and then the surface temperature at least got stuck. Things are however not that simple, and far more interesting.
As Steve Goddard has interestingly pointed out recently using RSS data going back to 1990 the Mt Pinatubo eruption in 1991 had a very important effect on global temperatures.
The Pinatubo eruption threw more sunlight-reflecting aerosols into the stratosphere since the Krakatoa outburst in 1883. Its millions of tonnes of sulphur dioxide reduced incident sunlight and had a maximum of 0.4 deg C cooling effect on global temperatures and an influence that lasted for several years.
The result of this temperature decrease is to increase the difference between the global temperatures of the 1990s and the 2000s. Removing this volcanic dip reduces quite significantly the temperature increase seen over the 1990 – 2013 period. When the errors are taken into account it is not impressive.
There was another very important volcanic eruption in the 1980s – El Chichon in 1982 – whose aerosols actually reduced solar irradiance by an even greater extent than Pinatubo.
Removing this volcanic signal also reduces the statistical significance of the rise in temperature seen since 1980. (In fact, statistically speaking, one is hard-pressed to find any statistically significant warming between 1980 – 1995.)
The El Chichon eruption is interesting because one of the strongest El Nino events, some say the strongest ever, occurred just after it. These two events had an interesting interplay for it seems that the global temperature rise induced by the warm water of the El Nino was offset by the cooling effect of the stratospheric aerosols from El Chichon. It is interesting to speculate what might had happened if El Chichon had not gone off. Would the 1982 El Nino have been as dramatic as the 1998 one? And would it have left in its wake elevated global temperatures, as 1998 seems to have done? What would have been the impact on environmental thinking, and on James Hansen’s global warming warning in 1988?
In the post-1980 global temperature data the effects of the El Ninos and La Ninas are obvious both as discrete events and as a source of ‘noise’ in the temperature of the past 16 years. The statistically significant increase in global temperature since 1980 occurred in the years after the Pinatubo eruption’s dip had ended, and before the onset of the strong 1998 El Nino. If strong El Ninos are a mechanism for changing global temperatures in a stepwise fashion we may have to wait for another strong one before the current temperature standstill ends. Perhaps we should also be looking at the link between the lifting of the post-volcanic aerosol burden and its possible effect on the initiation of El Ninos.
The Unthinkable
One of the interesting aspects of the current temperature standstill is that it persists despite several El Ninos and La Ninas.Since 2006 the influence of these events has been more pronounced in satellite data; El Ninos in 2007 and 2009-10, La Ninas in 2008, 2010–2012. These events have increased the ‘noise’ of the global temperature data in recent years.
(Courtesy Dr Roy Spencer – www.drroyspencer.com)
Removing this noise is tricky, but without it there is a hint, just a hint, that sans El Nino/La Nina effects and volcanic dips, the global temperature might be reducing. As usual, five more years of data will be fascinating to analyse.
Tallbloke's Talkshop 
See Twitter reply.
We can make a direct comparison between current temperatures, under ENSO neutral conditions since September, and April 2001- May 2002, which was the last time we had a long run of neutral conditions.
Allowing for a 6 month lag between ENSO changes and temperatures, latest GISS numbers for Feb – April are 0.08C lower than October 2001-November 2002.
http://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2013/05/30/waiting-for-hadcrut-again/
Not conclusive, but it suggests David is on the right track.
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“The Pinatubo eruption threw more sunlight-reflecting aerosols into the stratosphere since the Krakatoa outburst in 1883.”
-I am confused by what is being claimed here. Is Pinatubo the “greatest since Krakatoa”, as opposed to “more than Krakatoa”?
Yet the former interpretation is apparently contradicted by El Chicon “whose aerosols actually reduced solar irradiance by an even greater extent than Pinatubo”.
Graph 2 is the Mauna Loa Transmission. It is referenced to something, I don’t know what, as it is a percentage change (which implies a reference point). Through the 3 volcanic eruptions you see a decrease 1953 to 2003 of about 0.30%: I take this to be the change in light received at the Mauna Loa station(s).
If this is taken as an EQUIVALENT change in TOA TSI, it amounts to about 1.02 W/m2 for the whole Earth. But since the sun only shines on one-half of the Earth at a time, it actually amounts to 2.04 W/m2 in terms of energy-incoming. Trenberth looks for 0.58 W/m2 in his balancing, which is 0.58 W/m2 in real terms as he is dealing with a whole Earth system, not just the in-coming energy. The apparent loss is twice the apparent “missing” and almost 4 times what is missing in terms of in-coming.
This goes to error potential and data certainty, of course, which I claim means that the amount of energy for CO2 by humans cannot be determined by current data at all, in fact at this time no single or predominant non-natural factor can be identified by observation, despite the warmist claims.
This loss of in-coming at Mauna Loa, however, does not coincide with recent work on ground-based insolation in Spain (or mine in the Central UK), in which in-coming INCREASED overall during this time period (ending in 2010).
Looks to me as if cloud cover or aerosols has varied all over the world (and always does) and that any claim that the planet averages out year-to-year or even as a 10-year interval is worthy of challenge. It has been well calculated that (if cloud cover amounts to 26% “on average”, with on average albedos), an increase or decrease of another 2% (i.e. 24 – 28%) will equal the radiative forcing of 3.5 W/m2 said to be that of CO2. (50.6 W/m2 reflection at 26% coverage, albedo 60%, 5% refraction, giving 54.5 W/m2 same parameters except 28% coverage, for a change of 4.5 W/m2).
It is also worth noting that, due to orbital excentricity, the Earth receives 6.8% more or less TSI at perhihelion or aphelion position than on average, a swing of 23.2 W/m2 in both directions. This means that for one half of the year we do not get 341.5 W/m2 but 364.7 W/m2, and the other half of the year, 318.3 W/m2. A 28% cloud cover during aphelion, then, creates a 50.8 W/m2 cloud reflection loss, but during perhihelion, a 58.2 W/m2 reflection loss. The timing (as well as location) thus have a 1/2 year 7.4 W/m2 difference in atmospheric absorption and ground-receiving insolation (or 3.7 W/m2 as a whole year, whole Earth).
Unless we can nail down all of these time and location varying parameters of simple insolation to < 1.0 W/m2 in toto, how can we legitimately claim that we can balance the Earth's energy systems to the 0.29 W/m2 Trenberth needs to claim his 0.58 W/m2 "missing" energy is really MIA and not within his mathematical noise (signal-to-noise ratio of 2.0)?
Perhaps I'm missing something here. But I don't believe we have the data to say I'm wrong about the detail we both need and the detail we actually have.
Doug: What do you think about what this data analysys says about natural periodicity in the UAH global data series?
http://i1291.photobucket.com/albums/b550/RichardLH/uahtrendsinflectionfuture_zps7451ccf9.png.html
Dr. Whitehouse uses “Standstill” or “Pause” instead of “Warming Plateau”…..
This is not a minor point….choosing the most accurate term. Lets take the
60-year astronomic Scafetta cycle for example…..it has a 40 year plateau after
20 years of a preceding warming step. Here we are on a sound analysis,
opposite to 73 mistaken warming models, shown by Roy Spencer just a short
while ago. The simulants of those wrong models would talk of an unfortunate and
not foreseeable “Standstill”…in “model-data comparison” …..
Maybe, he would elucidate his choice….cheers, JS
Hi,
I think standstill or pause suffices, at least for me, as I don’t think anyone knows what will happen next. Most are waiting for the warming to resume, but we shall see. So whatever happens the global temperature has not changed for 16 years (or more), so standstill seems ok to me. Warming plateau on the other hand seems to prejudge what is happening. One thing is for certain, the standstill/pause/hiatus must eventually end.
best wishes, and congratulations on a fine website.
David Whitehouse.
Given that there will be short term natural (1 to 10 years) oscillations in any temperature record and given the chaotic nature of the world (beyond the obvious of cycle of day and year) why has so little work been done on identifying and accounting for those short term variations? Not as mechanisms, but as recorded structure to find the mechanisms.
Problem in removing the noise from the signal is that there are many, many different overlapping cycles (some identified, some not) which combine in different ways to produce the observed chaotic quasi-cyclical behavior of Earth climate.
Two of the main resulting quasi-cycles are at 60y and 210 years. Both peaked over the last few years and temperatures are back on their slow and erratic decline to a 100y(ish) cooling period.
Change is the normal for climate, as are weather extremes. Wonder how long it will be before the outlets of the clamorous MSM start warnings of Ice Age again, as the did in the 60s and 70s – they are completely out of touch with the reality of normal climate change!
Tenuc says:
June 12, 2013 at 2:50 pm
“Problem in removing the noise from the signal is that there are many, many different overlapping cycles (some identified, some not) which combine in different ways to produce the observed chaotic quasi-cyclical behavior of Earth climate.”
True. But there are also cycles < 60 years that are evident in the record (from UAH anyway) that need normailsing out to get a longer term cyclic picture.
Good lead post David Whitehouse.
“I think standstill or pause suffices, at least for me, as I don’t think anyone knows what will happen next.”
I tend to refer to any period where ‘no change’ is in evidence as a ‘hysteresis lapse’. When attractors are in equal/overlapping opposition there appears to be no change to the ‘observed dynamic’ and the system is seen to be in ‘stasis’. However, there are always ‘other mechanisms’ which ‘aren’t under observation’ that can explain the ‘stationary illusion’ of the observed phenomenon. We just don’t recognise all of these ‘other mechanisms’ yet.
Best regards, Ray.
Dear Dr. Whitehouse: Your quote:”If strong El Ninos are a mechanism for changing global temperatures in a stepwise fashion we may have to wait for another strong one before the current temperature standstill ends………””
This is all from Bob Tisdale, a No 1 guy, specialist and having our respect….He is totally convinced
that the Nino/Nina advances are cause and not effect…..but,
please try the following: Take any Holocene section of the graph of GISP2 and draw it out
larger sideward….. you will get to see the 61-year plateau wiggles, which are caused by the
Scafetta astronomical cycles……and the plateau wiggles, set higher or lower, are NOT caused
by Nino/Nina. For this reason, the present Scafetta plateau, on which we are on, will extend further to 2040. Therefore, there remains no possibility of a higher Tisdale Nino-plateau……the top has been reached already……If another Nino comes along, fine. But temps will fall back to the
initiating level after 1 year and not staying at higher level…..This is what GISP2 proves….please
try any section out, it will show the 61 year cycle….This cycle is one true
climate driver, one out of five (I won´t mention my website, Rog might get annoyed)…..JS
J.Seifert says: June 13, 2013 at 7:54 pm
Respect man, I also see La Nina and El Nino phenomenon as ‘effects’ and not ‘causal drivers’ to any phenomenon. Though, I arrived at this conclusion by careful consideration between the energy ‘sources’ and ‘attractors’ for the ‘physical configuration’.
I’ve not used GISP2 before, but it’s nice to know that a decent record may be there to be ‘mined’.
Best regards, Ray.