Al Gore explains "snowmageddon"

[BethesdaWX]

You can not include the La Niña years while not including the El Niño years.

I did a quick calculation.

Taking my trendlines that I had calculated.

Difference between trendline and temperature in the two databases, RSS, UAH.

Sum of differences (total positive/negative contribution)

April 2007 to June 2009---- UAH -4.05 RSS -3.78

July 2009 to January 2011 UAH+2.82 RSS +2.74

Average (montly contribution)

April 2007 to June 2009---- UAH -0.150 RSS -0.145

July 2009 to January 2011 UAH+0.149 RSS +0.144

I suppose I could have snubbed it off somewhere in November/December 2010.

But, anyway...

What this indicates is that the contribution of the + El Niño is no greater than the contribution of the - La Niña.

In fact chopping off those last two months (dec 2010, jan 2011) gives a slight higher monthly contribution from the El Niño, but still a negative overall contribution from the earlier La Niña.

(note, of course, my trendlines have a slight upward or downward slope depending on the DB. However, it is good enough for this demo.

Exactly, although its quite relative when speaking/considering such on either side as an "anomaly". Strong ENSO such as 1998, and 2009-2011 cannot be completely excluded on BOTH sides of ENSO, in the trending of global temperatures, because there are problems when assesing how the ENSO effect temperatures in the Long Run. Thus making an inference is somewhat mandatory, as to "where" the spike is really located, and how that spike effects the trend downstream.

However, if we exclude the "spike, or "dip", of both ENSOs, we can get a rough idea of the trend. Problem is, the trend is made up of these ENSO spikes. So, in this case, we Can infer, when considering Both the 2010 El Nino spike and the 2008 La Nina dip as anomalies, the trend is still down since 2002.

[skierinvermont]

Mere? I thought the .02C/decade divergence between UAH and RSS is significant?

Over 30 years - yes it is. The .016C difference between Clifford's and my calculation (actually more like .011C because my .07C was rounded up) is only over 8 years and do not even cover the same period because he included one more month of data than I did. The difference between UAH and RSS is over 30 years which makes the confidence interval much smaller, and is a comparison between the same start and end points, while Clifford's and my comparison was not.

Did you read the references I posted, especially the recent review Thorne et al. 2010? In the past 2 years there has been a growing consensus that the tropospheric trend is .2C/decade, much higher than UAH's .14C/decade. UAH and RSS have a 10-15% stratospheric contribution which biases them cold.

[skierinvermont]

Exactly, although its quite relative when speaking/considering such on either side as an "anomaly". Strong ENSO such as 1998, and 2009-2011 cannot be completely excluded on BOTH sides of ENSO, in the trending of global temperatures, because there are problems when assesing how the ENSO effect temperatures in the Long Run. Thus making an inference is somewhat mandatory, as to "where" the spike is really located, and how that spike effects the trend downstream.

However, if we exclude the "spike, or "dip", of both ENSOs, we can get a rough idea of the trend. Problem is, the trend is made up of these ENSO spikes. So, in this case, we Can infer, when considering Both the 2010 El Nino spike and the 2008 La Nina dip as anomalies, the trend is still down since 2002.

If you actually read what Clifford wrote he is saying the exact opposite of what you are. He is saying that the Nina anomaly was actually bigger than the Nino anomaly, and therefore the positive trend that both he and I derived, is actually biased cold. I arrive at the same conclusion Clifford does ... the ENSO trend since 2002 using a 6 month lag (July 2001 to August 2010) is strongly negative. Thus over the same period for which temperatures have risen, according to UAH, the ONI has decreased. In other words, ENSO caused cooling over the same period that we actually warmed. If ENSO had remained neutral over the same period, we would have witnessed more warming than we did.

Therefore not only is your original claim of cooling at -.1C/decade since 2002 completely erroneous, but so is your more recent modified claim of cooling after adjusting for ENSO. In fact, adjusting for ENSO actually increases the warming trend.

Here is a graph of the ONI index with a 6 month lag. As you can see the trend in ENSO has been negative over the same period for which temperatures have risen. This is the same conclusion Clifford came to.

[Clifford]

Exactly, although its quite relative when speaking/considering such on either side as an "anomaly". Strong ENSO such as 1998, and 2009-2011 cannot be completely excluded on BOTH sides of ENSO, in the trending of global temperatures, because there are problems when assesing how the ENSO effect temperatures in the Long Run. Thus making an inference is somewhat mandatory, as to "where" the spike is really located, and how that spike effects the trend downstream.

However, if we exclude the "spike, or "dip", of both ENSOs, we can get a rough idea of the trend. Problem is, the trend is made up of these ENSO spikes. So, in this case, we Can infer, when considering Both the 2010 El Nino spike and the 2008 La Nina dip as anomalies, the trend is still down since 2002.

Perhaps there is a flaw with the linear trendline calculations which would necessarily weight the activity near the ends of the line heavier than the activity towards the middle.

Thus, the weaker El Niño would get weighted heavier in the trendline calculations than the stronger La Niña only due to the fact that it was most recent.

In fact, the La Niña would get slightly weighted towards the lower start of the decade.

Of course, one always argues that one wants to know what is happening NOW rather than 3 years ago.

Just consider the overall trend as a FLAT decade.

[skierinvermont]

One other thing to consider...

We've been looking at the top few feet of a very deep and very dynamic heat-sink, the Oceans.

In fact, perhaps I've been thinking of things backwards. Perhaps one should think of an El Niño year as a cold year... and a La Niña year as a hot year...

Ok...

So if we think of warming as blocking the radiation of heat away from the earth, and cooling as more radiation of heat from space.

Then, an El Niño year would be the years that bring ocean heat to the ocean surfaces, and thus radiate more heat away from the oceans.

La Niña years would be the years that block the oceans from radiating heat.

So...

One needs to not only look at the top couple of feet of the oceans, but one should look at the whole oceans that are a couple of miles deep.

Anyway, I found two somewhat recent studies that were using two separate methods to measure the ocean temperatures. Unfortunately these data are very short-term data.

Sea level budget over 2003–2008: A reevaluation from GRACE space gravimetry,

satellite altimetry and Argo

A. Cazenave

Global and Planetary Change 65 (2009) 83–88

http://etienne.berth...al_GPC_2009.pdf

COOLING OF THE GLOBAL OCEAN SINCE 2003

Craig Loehle, Ph.D.

Energy & Environment · Vol. 20, No. 1&2, 2009

http://www.ncasi.org...il.aspx?id=3152

The first Cazenave study tries to estimate the global ocean temperature by subtracting out the volume change attributed to glacier melt, and calculate a temperature change based on a thermal expansion coefficient.

The second study, Loehle, uses ARGO buoy direct temperature data. It shows a high seasonal shift (it is supposed to be a global dataset). It uses data from the surface down to 900m (so it is influenced by the surface temperatures, what I was hoping to avoid).

So, unfortunately both datasets are short, and both terminate during the 2008 La Niña year.

They both conclude a slight mid-decade cooling trend in the ocean, more weighted by their start to endpoint selection. Looking at the minimums in the Cazenave study, I'm concluding that there wasn't much change.

They also both cite references of warming from the 90's.

What I was hoping to find was evidence that El Niño years were radiating more heat than La Niña years... At least the Loehle study is weighted by ocean surface temperatures, and thus seems to trend downward with the La Niña years. The Cazenave study may also be trending with the La Niña years.

I may break out a new topic later... after I find some more data.

Yes this is exactly what is happening! In Nino years the ocean radiates more heat and therefore warms slower. In Nina years the ocean radiates less heat and therefore warms faster.

It is important to note that the Loehle study has largely been rejected in more recent studies in the past 2 years. Here is a graph from a review paper of 0-700m OHC from Lyman 2010:

One thing about the Loehle study is that it only goes down to 900m. Here is a more recent study of 0-2000m from Schuckmann et al. 2009:

You can see OHC rose rapidly from Dec '06 to Mar '08 during the major Nina event then. It was stable during the 2006 Nino. It rose in 2005 during a developing weak Nina. It fell in late 2004 during the developing weak Nino. In the first graph I posted you can also see the rapid warming during the strong multi-year Nina event of '99-'01. Also some stabilization during the '98 super-Nino.

So there seems to be some correlation between OHC rising during Ninas and stabilizing during Ninos. Of course, the tropical pacific is only a fraction of the world's oceans.

Here is a graph that shows long-term OHC:

[nzucker]

No matter where you look, you see the plateau in global temps...whether you're doing 0-900m OHC, 0-700m OHC, UAH/RSS...it's just inevitably there. Definitely interesting how all the sources converge on a solution that shows the warming has abated somewhat, but that we still remain near record warmth globally.

[skierinvermont]

Perhaps there is a flaw with the linear trendline calculations which would necessarily weight the activity near the ends of the line heavier than the activity towards the middle.

Thus, the weaker El Niño would get weighted heavier in the trendline calculations than the stronger La Niña only due to the fact that it was most recent.

In fact, the La Niña would get slightly weighted towards the lower start of the decade.

Of course, one always argues that one wants to know what is happening NOW rather than 3 years ago.

Just consider the overall trend as a FLAT decade.

No this is not the case.

If the ONI shows a negative trend over the same period temperatures show a positive trend, then the temperature trend has been biased cold.

[skierinvermont]

No matter where you look, you see the plateau in global temps...whether you're doing 0-900m OHC, 0-700m OHC, UAH/RSS...it's just inevitably there. Definitely interesting how all the sources converge on a solution that shows the warming has abated somewhat, but that we still remain near record warmth globally.

There is no plateau in OHC... OHC has continued to warm this decade. It has slowed down slightly, but the most recent analyses of OHC agree that it has continued to warm.

Even for tropospheric or surface temperatures there is no plateau once you adjust for ENSO. ENSO adjusted temperatures have continued to rise since 1998, albeit slower than in the 90s.

[BethesdaWX]

If you actually read what Clifford wrote he is saying the exact opposite of what you are. He is saying that the Nina anomaly was actually bigger than the Nino anomaly, and therefore the positive trend that both he and I derived, is actually biased cold. I arrive at the same conclusion Clifford does ... the ENSO trend since 2002 using a 6 month lag (July 2001 to August 2010) is strongly negative. Thus over the same period for which temperatures have risen, according to UAH, the ONI has decreased. In other words, ENSO caused cooling over the same period that we actually warmed. If ENSO had remained neutral over the same period, we would have witnessed more warming than we did.

Therefore not only is your original claim of cooling at -.1C/decade since 2002 completely erroneous, but so is your more recent modified claim of cooling after adjusting for ENSO. In fact, adjusting for ENSO actually increases the warming trend.

Here is a graph of the ONI index with a 6 month lag. As you can see the trend in ENSO has been negative over the same period for which temperatures have risen. This is the same conclusion Clifford came to.

What the heck are you talking about? Can you READ?

You realize that the downward trend in solar activity has a warming impact until solar revamps on the other end of the cycle....right? The ONI is not the only player. AMO/PDO/SOI/AO/NAO/Solar/GCC. The PDO went negative in 2007, the AMO went positive in 1996

Since 2002: We should have been warming, not cooling.

Forcings emitted (warming/cooling)

Solar = Warming until 2009 (downward cycle)

ENSO =Warming, El Nino Dominated, with a powerful Nino in 2010 to Scew.

.

AMO = Warming

PDO = Warming 2002-2007, cooling 2007-2011.

We should have seen more cooling!

Your ONI graph actually vindicates me. Look at our current spike, then note the Lag of 6 month between ENSO and Temperature. The entire period is heavily El Nino weighted, coming off a massive El NIno 2010!

Dude, you are fighitng a loosing battle.

[skierinvermont]

What the heck are you talking about? Can you READ?

You realize that the downward trend in solar activity has a warming impact until solar revamps on the other end of the cycle....right? The ONI is not the only player. AMO/PDO/SOI/AO/NAO/Solar/GCC. The PDO went negative in 2007, the AMO went positive in 1996

Since 2002: We should have been warming, not cooling.

Forcings emitted (warming/cooling)

Solar = Warming until 2009 (downward cycle)

ENSO =Warming, El Nino Dominated, with a powerful Nino in 2010 to Scew.

.

AMO = Warming

PDO = Warming 2002-2007, cooling 2007-2011

We should have seen more cooling!

Your ONI graph actually vindicates me. Look at our current spike, then note the Lag of 6 month between ENSO and Temperature. The entire period is heavily El Nino weighted, coming off a massive El NIno 2010!

Dude, you are fighitng a loosing battle.

Your post is completely incorrect. Since 2002:

ENSO = cooling - started out in multiyear Nino headed into multi-year nina; the ONI trend since 2002 is NEGATIVE indicating a cooling pressure

Solar= started out in high activity but headed into low activity by 2005, very low solar activity since then has exerted a cooling pressure (time lag of 1-2 years in most studies)

AMO= no net trend

PDO= starts out warm in 2002-2006 then heads cold = cooling pressure

So a number of natural variables have made the period 2006-2010 quite cold, and yet the trend 2002-2010 is still positive.

[BethesdaWX]

What are you thinking?

Its as if you think the global temperature will follow the ONI....

[BethesdaWX]

Your post is completely incorrect. Since 2002:

ENSO = cooling - started out in multiyear Nino headed into multi-year nina; the ONI trend since 2002 is NEGATIVE indicating a cooling pressure

Solar= started out in high activity but headed into low activity by 2005, very low solar activity since then has exerted a cooling pressure (time lag of 1-2 years in most studies)

AMO= no net trend

PDO= starts out warm in 2002-2006 then heads cold = cooling pressure

So a number of natural variables have made the period 2006-2010 quite cold, and yet the trend 2002-2010 is still positive.

You are completely incorrect, as usual.

1) Take the 2010 El Nino OUT of the global temperature trend If you're gonna use a cooling ONI trend wityh a Massive spike in 2010... If you are going to include the 2010 El Nino spike in temperature trends since 2002, you need to note this as an anomaly

2) Wrong, studies show 2-8 year lag after peak, predominately. Peak in the cycle in a max, or in a min, is relative to the lag! Read!

3) AMO is a huge factor in the arctic, and the Northern Hemisphere alone. Its an atlantic version of the PDO.

4) PDO went cold in 2007, was warm previously

AMO has no trend WTF? Year 2010 has a Record warm AMO not listed in the graph (thru 2009 only). But you get the point........actually, you probably don't.

[skierinvermont]

You are completely incorrect, as usual.

1) Take the 2010 El Nino OUT of the global temperature trend If you're gonna use a cooling ONI trend wityh a Massive spike in 2010... If you are going to include the 2010 El Nino spike in temperature trends since 2002, you need to note this as an anomaly

2) Wrong, studies show 2-8 year lag after peak,predominately

3) AMO is a huge factor in the arctic, and the Northern Hemisphere alone. Its an atlantic version of the PDO.

4) PDO went cold in 2007, was warm previously

AMO has no trend WTF?

1) You can't take out the 2010 ENSO spike but not take out the 07-09 Nina DIP or the 02-06 multi-year NINO. This is why we perform trend analyses. The trend in ENSO since 2002 has been NEGATIVE indicating a relative cooling pressure. Both Clifford and I have explained this to you.

2) I have posted the temperature to solar cycle correlations before. They show a 1-2 year lag.

3) The AMO is not a big factor. It shows no significant correlation to global temperatures over the last 100 years. I see no reason why it would have no correlation for the last 100 years, and then suddenly show a correlation after the year 2000. Moreover, it has shown no net trend since 2002.

4) Yes the PDO went cold in 2007, was warm 02-06... therefore it has had a net cooling trend over the period 2002-2010.

[BethesdaWX]

1) You can't take out the 2010 ENSO spike but not take out the 07-09 Nina DIP or the 02-06 multi-year NINO. This is why we perform trend analyses. The trend in ENSO since 2002 has been NEGATIVE indicating a relative cooling pressure.

2) I have posted the temperature to solar correlations before. They show a 1-2 year lag.

3) The AMO is not a big factor. It shows no significant correlation to global temperatures over the last 100 years. I see no reason why it would have no correlation for the last 100 years, and then suddenly show a correlation after the year 2000. Moreover, it has shown no net trend since 2002.

4) Yes the PDO went cold in 2007, was warm 02-06... therefore it has had a net cooling trend over the period 2002-2010.

Waaaaaaaaaat? This is why you need to take a class on statistics and mathematical modeling.

1) The 2010 ONI/El Nino spike was the highest since 1998, or second largest in the satellite era.....IT IS AN OUTLYING ANOMALY....that is my point.

2) The studies you posted showed a 1-2 year lag, the studies I posted showed a lag between 2-8 years. Your point?

3) Of course the AMO does not correlate to temperatures.... it is an enhancer/modifier in the PDO cycle! The 2 PDO's (NH & SH) correlate with ENSO, which correlates with temperature. The AMO does a different Job. The AMO has control over Arctic and upper NH temperatures.........this is why all the great arctic outbreaks occured in a -AMO. Why would global temps correlate to the AMO? Greenland temps do, as do the arctic temps.....but not the globe! That is PDO/Solar more than AMO.

4) The PDO was positive last year! Mega El Nino, +PDO, record +AMO.....its all there for you to read.

Thus, we should have been WARMING, not cooling.

[tacoman25]

Over 30 years - yes it is. The .016C difference between Clifford's and my calculation (actually more like .011C because my .07C was rounded up) is only over 8 years and do not even cover the same period because he included one more month of data than I did. The difference between UAH and RSS is over 30 years which makes the confidence interval much smaller, and is a comparison between the same start and end points, while Clifford's and my comparison was not.

Did you read the references I posted, especially the recent review Thorne et al. 2010? In the past 2 years there has been a growing consensus that the tropospheric trend is .2C/decade, much higher than UAH's .14C/decade. UAH and RSS have a 10-15% stratospheric contribution which biases them cold.

The reason I don't see the .02C/decade difference as significant is that the vast majority of the time, RSS and UAH are not that far apart. And it's not like one is always warmer/cooler than the other. I don't think just looking at a starting point and end point at any given time tells the whole story.

At any point, it's illogical to argue that .02C/decade difference is significant, but the IPCC falling out of their predicted range (larger) is not.

[donsutherland1]

This is why you need to take a class on statistics and mathematical modeling.

BethesdaWX,

Your vehement disagreement is noted., but don't you believe this is overkill? After all, a number of us pointed out that trendlines are not "drawn" but are calculated. That you might not have known that is not a problem, as I suspect that you have not yet had a college statistics course.

Hence, information that trendlines are calculated might both be new and also a learning opportunity. FWIW, one uses the "least squares method" to calculate trendlines. Most spreadsheet software has statistical functions/capabilities by which one can calculate a trendline, so the tedious approach of using simultaneous equations to calculate it by hand is unnecessary.

[BethesdaWX]

BethesdaWX,

Your vehement disagreement is noted., but don't you believe this is overkill? After all, a number of us pointed out that trendlines are not "drawn" but are calculated. That you might not have known that is not a problem, as I suspect that you have not yet had a college statistics course.

Hence, information that trendlines are calculated might both be new and also a learning opportunity. FWIW, one uses the "least squares method" to calculate trendlines. Most spreadsheet software has statistical functions/capabilities by which one can calculate a trendline, so the tedious approach of using simultaneous equations to calculate it by hand is unnecessary.

My point was that counting "anomalies" , or extranneous values, into a trendline, is decieving, and scews graph. Whether it is calculated or not,does not change this.

I am taking college statistics and mathematical modeling at this moment, actually.

[donsutherland1]

I am taking college statistics and mathematical modeling at this moment, actually.

That's great. Perhaps you might want to ask your professor how he/she would handle the El Niño event when calculating a 2002-10 trendline. I'm quite certain I know his/her response,but I believe you might find his/her reasoning quite insightful. The issue you raise is actually quite common when one is trying to analyze data.

Good luck with your courses.

[BethesdaWX]

That's great. Perhaps you might want to ask your professor how he/she would handle the El Niño event when calculating a 2002-10 trendline. I'm quite certain I know his/her response,but I believe you might find his/her reasoning quite insightful. The issue you raise is actually quite common when one is trying to analyze data.

Good luck with your courses.

Well thankyou. I most certainly will.

I think I know what you're hinting at here though.

[Snow_Miser]

Yes this is exactly what is happening! In Nino years the ocean radiates more heat and therefore warms slower. In Nina years the ocean radiates less heat and therefore warms faster.

It is important to note that the Loehle study has largely been rejected in more recent studies in the past 2 years. Here is a graph from a review paper of 0-700m OHC from Lyman 2010:

One thing about the Loehle study is that it only goes down to 900m. Here is a more recent study of 0-2000m from Schuckmann et al. 2009:

You can see OHC rose rapidly from Dec '06 to Mar '08 during the major Nina event then. It was stable during the 2006 Nino. It rose in 2005 during a developing weak Nina. It fell in late 2004 during the developing weak Nino. In the first graph I posted you can also see the rapid warming during the strong multi-year Nina event of '99-'01. Also some stabilization during the '98 super-Nino.

So there seems to be some correlation between OHC rising during Ninas and stabilizing during Ninos. Of course, the tropical pacific is only a fraction of the world's oceans.

Here is a graph that shows long-term OHC:

Very disappointing post. It is clear that the sources came from some blog, and you didn't look past that. How were you measuring the deep ocean temperature data before ARGO data came into play? ARGO data started in 2002, FYI.

The oceans have been cooling which is contrary to climate model predictions link See how Argo is measuring ocean temperatures throughout the globe link Argo research (with its 3,300 ocean buoys) has found ocean temperatures are cooler. link link

http://isthereglobalcooling.com/

The Deep ocean temperatures (All 3300 Bouys have measured it) have cooled since 2002. Unfortunately a larger timescale is near impossible, contrary to what your first graph shows, we couldn't measure deep ocean temperature all the way to the 1990s.

And I always love it when the advocates tell the skeptics to "stop cherry picking data."

This takes out 2002, and leaves the last two years as if they have not even existed.......... cherry picking at it's best.

[Snow_Miser]

Some 3,000 scientific robots that are plying the ocean have sent home a puzzling message. These diving instruments suggest that the oceans have not warmed up at all over the past four or five years. That could mean global warming has taken a breather. Or it could mean scientists aren't quite understanding what their robots are telling them.

This is puzzling in part because here on the surface of the Earth, the years since 2003 have been some of the hottest on record. But Josh Willis at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory says the oceans are what really matter when it comes to global warming.

In fact, 80 percent to 90 percent of global warming involves heating up ocean waters. They hold much more heat than the atmosphere can. So Willis has been studying the ocean with a fleet of robotic instruments called the Argo system. The buoys can dive 3,000 feet down and measure ocean temperature. Since the system was fully deployed in 2003, it has recorded no warming of the global oceans.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=88520025

[BethesdaWX]

http://www.npr.org/t...toryId=88520025

Whether our warming is Natural or Man-Made, there is no reason for heat to start "disappearing" suddenly since 2003, and not do so beforehand. The real problem is our measurements and what we attribute them to. UOHC & OHC anoms in general could not be measured accurately until very recently, so the fact that the newer systems are not showing significant OHC increases raises a red flag. Another issue could be, our measurement of sea levels are either error filled, or the cause of such sea level rises are not what we think. Or perhaps some natural phenomenon is responsible for the change.

Heat energy deep in the oceans has been measured, and can be stored for over 5000yrs, and may never effect UOHC anoms, so if that is where it is going, theres nothing we can do about it. Any way you slice it, whatever changed in 2003...it was either our measurements, or something natural that we don't know about, regardless on whether the warming has been created Naturally or by human emissions of Co2.

Remember, there are also multi-century deep ocean current shifts that cycle, and alter things quite significantly. Unfortunately we don't know much about what goes on down there at this point.

[skierinvermont]

http://www.npr.org/t...toryId=88520025

Old story based on a flawed 2008 study. Multiple independent sources including updated analyses of the ARGO network (the robots) show the oceans have warmed since 2003:

Red line below based on ARGO:

Black line is Leuliette 2009, a more recent analysis of ARGO vs Willis 2008 (gray line):

And let's not forget about long term OHC:

Also Schucmann 2009:

[Snow_Miser]

Old story based on a flawed 2008 study. Multiple independent sources including updated analyses of the ARGO network (the robots) show the oceans have warmed since 2003:

Red line below based on ARGO:

Black line is Leuliette 2009, a more recent analysis of ARGO vs Willis 2008 (gray line):

And let's not forget about long term OHC:

Also Schucmann 2009:

You obviously did not read this post:

http://www.americanwx.com/bb/index.php?/topic/12444-al-gore-explains-snowmageddon/page__view__findpost__p__452346

[skierinvermont]

Very disappointing post. It is clear that the sources came from some blog, and you didn't look past that. How were you measuring the deep ocean temperature data before ARGO data came into play? ARGO data started in 2002, FYI.

http://isthereglobalcooling.com/

The Deep ocean temperatures (All 3300 Bouys have measured it) have cooled since 2002. Unfortunately a larger timescale is near impossible, contrary to what your first graph shows, we couldn't measure deep ocean temperature all the way to the 1990s.

And I always love it when the advocates tell the skeptics to "stop cherry picking data."

This takes out 2002, and leaves the last two years as if they have not even existed.......... cherry picking at it's best.

Actually I am quite familiar with the literature on OHC and have read many of the recent peer-reviewed papers on the subject including those from which the figures were drawn.

1) You are citing a 2008 paper that has since been rejected in the primary literature. The more recent analyses of ARGO data say the oceans have warmed since 2003 (see Schuckmann 2009, Cazenave 2009, and Leuliette 2009). You are citing Willis 2008. I doubt very much whether Willis still stands by his 2008 study that was the basis for the NPR link you provided from 2008.

2) The chart I posted doesn't show 2002 because ARGO was not fully operational until around 2003-2004 and their are major calibration issues early in the data set. It doesn't show 2009 or 2010 because it was published in 2009.

3) The long-term graphs of OHC are based on steric sea level rises. There has been a well documented rise in global sea levels attributable to steric sea level rise. In other words, the oceans expanding as they warm.

[skierinvermont]

You obviously did not read this post:

http://www.americanw...post__p__452346

Yes, I missed it. See my response above. You are using old outdated research. The author of the study you are basing your claim on probably would not stand by his study from 3 years ago. Your entire claim of cooling oceans rests upon a study the primary author of which would probably retract the study.

[skierinvermont]

Indeed, upon closer inspection of the literature, Josh Willis has retracted his claim in a March 2008 study that the global oceans were cooling from 2003-2008. Unfortunately many skeptic blogs still reference the early 2008 study, even though numerous studies have since corrected it and the primary author, Josh Willis, has retracted it.

This is a classic example of why one needs to rely on the primary literature, especially the most recent primary literature, and not blogs.

[nzucker]

Even the Shuckmann study, however, shows something surprising to those who believe seriously in AGW: 0-2000m OHC wasn't increasing at all during the 07-08 La Niña event. I'm not sure if much of the response to ENSO changes is only felt initially in the shallower waters, but you'd think there would be a serious increase in OHC with the 07-08 La Niña which peaked at -1.4C on the ONI scale. I wonder if this may be related to the fact that surface temperatures were also much quicker to cool during the 07-08 La Niña than in 98-99, despite the events being of similar strength, referring to the UAH analysis that showed the global temperature anomaly dipping below -.1C on the old baseline. This may indicate that another factor such as the solar minimum is starting to have a bigger impact on global climate, which could be key in invalidating the IPCC computer models showing a warming rate of over .2C/decade.

Do you have a chart for 0-2000m OHC this year? It will be interesting to see how the 10-11 strong Niña affects OHC; in theory, one would think that a significant increase would be seen since less energy is being radiated to the atmosphere in a -ENSO event that buries heat in the world's oceans. If we don't see this tendency, we'll have to consider more seriously the idea that the low solar activity is halting global warming in its tracks; January's sunspot number was only 19, and activity remains near the levels of the Maunder Minimum and well below NASA predictions from just a few years ago. In addition to creating local change in the mid-latitudes due to the -AO/-NAO, the decline in solar may have bigger ramifications in the long term. A new study of OHC after this La Niña ends would be warranted...

[Ottawa Blizzard]

Gore is a clown, charlatan and liar at the same time. In this movie, he speculates that winters were becoming milder. Now they're colder? I mean come on. Either AGW makes weather colder, or warmer. Not both.

While I am no fan of Al Gore, I feel it must be said that winters in canada are warmer than they were 30 years ago, as demonstrated by the data I've posted in other threads over the past month.

[nzucker]

While I am no fan of Al Gore, I feel it must be said that winters in canada are warmer than they were 30 years ago, as demonstrated by the data I've posted in other threads over the past month.

I don't think that's the point...the problem is that Gore and many others were claiming that AGW was making winters milder, and now that winters in the mid-latitudes have become colder/snowier, the AGW crowd is trying to spin this as another effect of anthropogenic climate change due to Siberian precipitation patterns regardless of the fact they just said a few years ago that the weather would be less cold and snowy because of carbon emissions, not more so. It's another example of the theory being manipulated constantly to fit the newest trends, instead of sticking to actual scientific findings/observations. Gore and others devoted to the cause are consistently altering the theory to fit with whatever happens, therefore it can never be wrong.