Adjusting Global Temperature for ONI, TSI, and Pinatubo

[Snow_Miser]

The warming rate should have slowed immediately when the PDO sharply declined in 1999. Just like a pot when turning the stove from high to low (actually in this case it is more like putting it in an ice bath since the PDO went negative).  Instead, the warming trend remained the same right up until 2010. There is no correlation evident on my graph with the PDO, magic lags or no lags. 

 

Why? Because the PDO alters global temperature by altering the ENSO state, which my graph already accounts for. 

 

The 15 year warming rate has declined significantly in recent years, which may be from an effect from the PDO and solar effects.

 

 

You're also confusing ENSO and the PDO. While the PDO influences ENSO, they are totally different. ENSO is a yearly oscillation, whereas the PDO is a multidecadal oscillation. Taking out ENSO is not the same thing as removing the PDO. The PDO as proposed by Dr. Spencer, which blizzard already linked up to could modulate and contribute significantly to multidecadal warming periods by altering the Cloud Cover by 1-2%. That is a large impact that remains in your chart.

[skierinvermont]

The 15 year warming rate has declined significantly in recent years, which may be from an effect from the PDO and solar effects.

 

 

 

You're also confusing ENSO and the PDO. While the PDO influences ENSO, they are totally different. ENSO is a yearly oscillation, whereas the PDO is a multidecadal oscillation. Taking out ENSO is not the same thing as removing the PDO. The PDO as proposed by Dr. Spencer, which blizzard already linked up to could modulate and contribute significantly to multidecadal warming periods by altering the Cloud Cover by 1-2%. That is a large impact that remains in your chart.

 

Again, the PDO largely influences cloudcover due to the changes in ENSO. ENSO is known to cause major changes in cloud cover. 

 

 

The 15- year warming rate after adjusting for ENSO and TSI has not slowed. Thus either the PDO, besides modulating ENSO, has had no effect, or AGW is even worse than we thought and is counteracting the cooling effect of the PDO ex-ENSO.

 

More likely, it is the former the PDO doesn't effect global temperature very much at all outside of the effect it has via modulating ENSO. 

 

 

 

Or are you suggesting that AGW is even worse than thought and is counteracting the cooling effect of the PDO? Perhaps the high climate sensitivities of 4-5C+ are correct after all? I didn't take you for a CAGWer snowlover!

[Snow_Miser]

Again, the PDO largely influences cloudcover due to the changes in ENSO. ENSO is known to cause major changes in cloud cover. 

 

 

The 15- year warming rate after adjusting for ENSO and TSI has not slowed. Thus either the PDO, besides modulating ENSO, has had no effect, or AGW is even worse than we thought and is counteracting the cooling effect of the PDO ex-ENSO.

 

More likely, it is the former the PDO doesn't effect global temperature very much at all outside of the effect it has via modulating ENSO. 

 

 

 

Or are you suggesting that AGW is even worse than thought and is counteracting the cooling effect of the PDO? Perhaps the high climate sensitivities of 4-5C+ are correct after all? I didn't take you for a CAGWer snowlover!

 

The -PDO modulates the cloud cover based off of the change in the atmospheric circulation from changing weather patterns on a multidecadal timeframe. The PDO and ENSO are linked, but they are not the same thing. Removing ENSO is not the same thing as removing the PDO.

 

The PDO has also really not turned all that negative recently until several years ago, and that matches the slight cooling/flatlining plateau on your chart nicely.

[blizzard1024]

LOL

Don't expect many of us here on this SCIENCE board to take Mr. Creationist/Denier/Heartland stooge Dr. Roy Spencer too seriously..

Here are some of his gems for those of you unaware..More goodies below..

http://www.skepticalscience.com/skeptic_Roy_Spencer.htm

 

This guy brings his religious views into ALL of his climate "research". 

Any one who follows this hack's work is not interested in legitimate climate change discussion...

That's BS.  I don't care about his religious beliefs. READ his papers and let me know what you don't agree with moron. 

[blizzard1024]

The 15 year warming rate has declined significantly in recent years, which may be from an effect from the PDO and solar effects.

 

 

You're also confusing ENSO and the PDO. While the PDO influences ENSO, they are totally different. ENSO is a yearly oscillation, whereas the PDO is a multidecadal oscillation. Taking out ENSO is not the same thing as removing the PDO. The PDO as proposed by Dr. Spencer, which blizzard already linked up to could modulate and contribute significantly to multidecadal warming periods by altering the Cloud Cover by 1-2%. That is a large impact that remains in your chart.

 

If low clouds increase by 1-2% that would equate to 2.4 to 4.8 w/m2 which dwarfs what CO2 has done so far.... You are correct. Clouds are key to our climate. 

[skierinvermont]

The -PDO modulates the cloud cover based off of the change in the atmospheric circulation from changing weather patterns on a multidecadal timeframe. The PDO and ENSO are linked, but they are not the same thing. Removing ENSO is not the same thing as removing the PDO.

 

The PDO has also really not turned all that negative recently until several years ago, and that matches the slight cooling/flatlining plateau on your chart nicely.

 

 

Ooooh "change in the atmospheric circulation from changing weather patterns on a multidecadal timeframe." Big words I'm so impressed SL! Could you actually post some evidence for this statement? The primary change in weather pattern associated with a -PDO is the same as for a Nina. 

 

Also there is ZERO evidence for a multidecadal oscillation in cloud cover correlating with the PDO, other than the differences we typically observe between a Nina and Nino.

[WeatherRusty]

That's BS.  I don't care about his religious beliefs. READ his papers and let me know what you don't agree with moron. 

 

His religious beliefs go to his sense of reason and logic. I highly doubt he can separate two, just turning off his irrational side when addressing science. There is a reason only 6% of American scientists are self professed political conservatives.

 

No one has called you a moron that I am aware of, why did you go there?

[WeatherRusty]

When will people understand that ocean occillations like ENSO and PDO do nothing to add or subtract from Earth's heat content? When these cycles go into their "cool" phases, all that is happening is cooler water from depth is brought to the surface. This cools the atmosphere, but at the same time adds to the heat content of the oceans by exposing the cooler water to sunlight. You get more clouds during warm phases and fewer clouds during cool phases. A radiative balance is achived in the longer term due to all of this, and that is all that ultimately matters.

[Mallow]

When will people understand that ocean occillations like ENSO and PDO do nothing to add or subtract from Earth's heat content? When these cycles go into their "cool" phases, all that is happening is cooler water from depth is brought to the surface. This cools the atmosphere, but at the same time adds to the heat content of the oceans by exposing the cooler water to sunlight. You get more clouds during warm phases and fewer clouds during cool phases. A radiative balance is achived in the longer term due to all of this, and that is all that ultimately matters.

 

I mentioned this earlier, among many other points. Before I realized that nobody was actually reading what I was saying, and the arguments were all against made-up statements that I had supposedly made, instead. Arguing against strawmen is about as frustrating as it gets.

[WeatherRusty]

I mentioned this earlier, among many other points. Before I realized that nobody was actually reading what I was saying, and the arguments were all against made-up statements that I had supposedly made, instead. Arguing against strawmen is about as frustrating as it gets.

 

You used to be an excellent poster in here, especially back in the Eastern days. I understand the frustration, but engaging in this debate hones my own understanding in areas of the science I feel somewhat lacking. My area is radiative physics, which is the fundamental starting point in all of this and forms the scientific basis for AGW. Other folks bring differing areas of interest to the table. The greater the diversity of posters the better. Stop back in once in a while. Your contributions will be appreciated by at least some of us!

[PottercountyWXobserver]

When will people understand that ocean occillations like ENSO and PDO do nothing to add or subtract from Earth's heat content? When these cycles go into their "cool" phases, all that is happening is cooler water from depth is brought to the surface. This cools the atmosphere, but at the same time adds to the heat content of the oceans by exposing the cooler water to sunlight. You get more clouds during warm phases and fewer clouds during cool phases. A radiative balance is achived in the longer term due to all of this, and that is all that ultimately matters.

 

This x100, I'm sick of people claiming the ocean currents are magically creating their own heat. Ocean currents can only redistribute heat energy and nothing else.

[Jonger]

I agree with what WeatherRusty wrote above and I would like for you to post more here. you could help educate people about what the good science is and maybe the forum would be moderated in a way to remove the noise. we should not still be having to point out that Roy Spencer has no place in a science-based climate discussion.

 

Are you intentionally forgetting to capitalize the first word of a new sentence just to bug me? You capitalized Roy Spencer's name, so you must have a working shift key.

 

Why are you so hell bent on silencing people on a public forum? None of what Roy Spencer has said is all that far fetched, seriously.

[Snow_Miser]

Ooooh "change in the atmospheric circulation from changing weather patterns on a multidecadal timeframe." Big words I'm so impressed SL! Could you actually post some evidence for this statement? The primary change in weather pattern associated with a -PDO is the same as for a Nina. 

 

Also there is ZERO evidence for a multidecadal oscillation in cloud cover correlating with the PDO, other than the differences we typically observe between a Nina and Nino.

 

And there you go spouting off with the ad-hominem attacks. Typical.

 

You have repeatedly posted time and time again that we do not have reliable cloud data. As of right now, it's a hypothesis that can explain the multidecadal variability in the temperature record over the last 100-150 years. This hypothesis has not been disproven from observations, so it still remains a hypothesis.

 

The PDO is not an index of Sea Surface Temperatures, it's an index of the atmospheric circulation, an index of weather patterns. You claim that the only thing that the PDO can influence is ENSO, which is absurd.

[Snow_Miser]

When will people understand that ocean occillations like ENSO and PDO do nothing to add or subtract from Earth's heat content? When these cycles go into their "cool" phases, all that is happening is cooler water from depth is brought to the surface. This cools the atmosphere, but at the same time adds to the heat content of the oceans by exposing the cooler water to sunlight. You get more clouds during warm phases and fewer clouds during cool phases. A radiative balance is achived in the longer term due to all of this, and that is all that ultimately matters.

 

We are talking about the global surface temperature, not Heat Content. The PDO and AMO can absolutely modulate the rate at which these temperatures are increasing on a multidecadal timeframe. The PDO/AMO have never been claimed to be responsible for the long term warming trend in this thread.

[Snow_Miser]

How about the AMO? That's another oscillation in the Atlantic that Skier hasn't removed from his chart either:

 

https://pantherfile.uwm.edu/kravtsov/www/downloads/Presentations2010-2011/AMO_AGU10.pdf

[blizzard1024]

And there you go spouting off with the ad-hominem attacks. Typical.

 

You have repeatedly posted time and time again that we do not have reliable cloud data. As of right now, it's a hypothesis that can explain the multidecadal variability in the temperature record over the last 100-150 years. This hypothesis has not been disproven from observations, so it still remains a hypothesis.

 

The PDO is not an index of Sea Surface Temperatures, it's an index of the atmospheric circulation, an index of weather patterns. You claim that the only thing that the PDO can influence is ENSO, which is absurd.

yeah what is up with the ad-hominem attacks on this forum? pretty sad. some of us are not going away and we bring up good points. I also have downloaded a ton of

peer viewed papers on climate relating to this area. I will post what I find and my thoughts in the coming weeks. Maybe this will convince me or maybe not? who knows. I am

a skeptical person on all science fronts...not just climate science. Just my nature. I question everything that is complex and not certain. I don't see anything wrong with this

approach. I learn a lot. This does not make me a denier or a right winger or an Anthony Watts worshiper either.  

[skierinvermont]

And there you go spouting off with the ad-hominem attacks. Typical.

 

You have repeatedly posted time and time again that we do not have reliable cloud data. As of right now, it's a hypothesis that can explain the multidecadal variability in the temperature record over the last 100-150 years. This hypothesis has not been disproven from observations, so it still remains a hypothesis.

 

The PDO is not an index of Sea Surface Temperatures, it's an index of the atmospheric circulation, an index of weather patterns. You claim that the only thing that the PDO can influence is ENSO, which is absurd.

 

Complete rubbish. The PDO is the leading empirical orthogonal function of North Pacific SSTs. The cause of it is not known, but it I would guess it is some self-reinforcing interaction with ENSO (EDIT: the paper Don posted suggests something similar to this along with a couple other causes)..

 

It is possible the PDO has some effect on global temperature outside of that already associated with ENSO. However, the effect is likely to be quite small, and it's entirely possible that the effect of a -PDO is warming given the fact that warm SSTs dominate the north pacific in a -PDO. The primary cooling effect of a -PDO is almost certainly the increased tendency for La Ninas which have a significant cooling effect. 

 

After the effect of TSI, ENSO, and aerosols have been removed, there is very little multi-decadal variability left to explain. Even if one were to attribute this entirely to the PDO, it wouldn't amount to much. 

[WeatherRusty]

We are talking about the global surface temperature, not Heat Content. The PDO and AMO can absolutely modulate the rate at which these temperatures are increasing on a multidecadal timeframe. The PDO/AMO have never been claimed to be responsible for the long term warming trend in this thread.

 

Maybe not in this thread, but certainly and repeatedly elsewhere. Isn't it interesting to observe in the global temperature record that all influences and negative feedback combined never serve to produce a long term cooling trend, only a slowing or pause in the warming followed by resumed warming?

 

Regarding the PDO, you are correct that it involves a shifting of general atmospheric circulation features which bring about changes in prevailing wind. This produces wind stress on the surface water, thereby driving warm water northward and cold water southward in particular patterns and also in the case of ENSO, dredging cold from the depths in the east to the surface and forcing it westward across the equitoral Pacific. All any of this does is to redistribute the warm and cool pools of water, and bring cold water from below to the surface. Of course the overiding atmosphere takes on the characteristic temperature of the water it resides over.

[skierinvermont]

I thought an ENSO-only adjusted chart would be interesting. It is especially useful when having a conversation about the sun. Next time someone claims that the cooling trend from 2005 to present shows the sun is causing cooling, you can show that actually the cooling is because of La Nina.

 

Some people also like to use HadCRUT4 or, even worse, HadCRUT3 (which excludes the arctic) to claim global cooling from 2002, 2003, or 2004 to present. This is partially due to their selection of source. HadCRUT3 excludes the arctic, and HadCRUT4 is only one of several global analyses. And while it's not quite as egregious as starting in the 2005 El Nino, it is almost as egregious. ENSO is a substantial cooling agent over any of those time periods. 

 

A proper analysis, which combines HadCRUT4, NCDC, and GISS, and then applies an ENSO correction, shows that a trend starting in 2002, 2003, 2004, or 2005 shows warming. The only start years that show cooling trends to present using this method are 2010 and 2011. 

 

Trends starting in 2005 or later do not show very much warming at all. But they do not show the cooling one would expect if the record low solar activity in recent years is a strong forcing agent. 

 

EDIT: I should have said the red line is the unadjusted GISS, HadCRUT4, NCDC mean and the blue line is the ENSO corrected mean.

[AvantHiatus]

Exactly, it appears that GHG forcing and reduced solar activity are canceling each other out. Producing a period of stable temperature trends.

[skierinvermont]

I should have said the red line is the unadjusted GISS, HadCRUT4, NCDC mean and the blue line is the ENSO corrected mean.

[tacoman25]

2012 still fits the trend line well

 

Kind of. It was still the coldest year relative to the trend line since the early 1980s.

[skierinvermont]

Here is a preliminary look for how 2013 is shaping up using the methods outlined above. I used a 3-month lagged ONI value of -.2C and bumped the 1-yr lagged TSI by .12W/m2 (an estimate for 2012 because I didn't take the time to find the actual data). For temperature I bumped last year's value by .04C because GISS is likely to finish .02-.03C warmer than last year and Had4 is likely to finish .04 or .05C warmer. I didn't look at NOAA. It might only bounce by .03C.

 

The discrepancy between ENSO and TSI adjusted temperature and the long-term trend grew slightly, suggesting other factors are at play or the statistical adjustments are not a complete representation of the actual effects. There has now been zero TSI and ENSO-adjusted warming since 2005. This is not to say that ENSO and TSI have not been partially responsible for the lack of warming since 2005, but my statistical methods do not detect the effect. For example, I suspect that some of the warmth in 2005-2007 was a lagged effect from the 2002 solar peak, but my model only uses a 1-yr lag. 

 

You'll notice large bounces in 1997-98 and 2005 (18-19 and 26), which suggests to me that certain types of ENSO events have lasting effects. I think that my model does a particularly poor job of simulating the effect of the 2005 El Nino.

[chubbs]

There is definately some additional natural variability that is not captured in the chart surface T adjustments. This variability would be more apparemt if the graph was extended back into the 60s+70s when the T trend was also relatively flat. Most likely cause is different partioning of heat between atmosphere and deep ocean related to PDO and other longer-term fluctuations in ocean/atmosphere circulation. 50+ year time periods are needed to allow AGW signal to become much larger than natural variability. 

[skierinvermont]

Well part of the way that a -PDO cools surface temperatures is through La Ninas. And my model statistically removes ENSO. But there could be other ways the PDO effects it other than just ENSO. Or possibly some cumulative effect of repeated ENSOs. I am skeptical of large cumulative effects though because the force sustaining it must become increasingly larger to offset the ever growing radiative forcing of GHGs. The earth can never deviate too far from its radiative equilibrium temperature.

 

The other thing suggesting it is not just natural variability responsible for the slow-down is that there has also been a slowdown in OHC increase from .8W/m2 to .5W/m2. Given the slow increase in surface temperature, the earth's energy imbalance should be widening not shrinking. There has been some change in the earth's atmosphere that has reduced the energy imbalance. Given the initial energy imbalance of .8W/m2 up to about 2000, and the fact that the slower rate of surface temperature increase since then should have widened this imbalance to 1 or 1.2W/m2, but instead it has shrunk to .5W/m2, I would guess there has been some change in the earth's atmosphere that is reducing the earth's energy imbalance by about .6W/m2. 

 

This could be aerosols, cloud cover, water vapor etc.

[skierinvermont]

Here is an update through 2016. There was a small bounce in 2014 and 2015 from my last update. There has been a big bounce in 2016 if current temperatures are a good indicator of how the year will progress.


The method uses GISS only instead of GISS/Had4/NCDC averaged in the original. I also just eyeballed TSI 2012-2015 and put the peak about .2W/m2 lower than the early 2000s peak. If I was off a little it wouldn't make more than a few thousandths of a degree of difference to global temperature.

 

The method adjusts .105C per 1C of 4-month lagged ONI anomaly (derived from a regression). It adjusts .1C per 1W/m2 of TSI anomaly.

 

For 2016 I assumed GISS would finish +1.05C and the 4-month lagged ONI would be +1.25C (.1C stronger than 1998). 

[skierinvermont]

The last three years really highlight how persistent this trend is. No year varies by more than a tenth of a degree from the trend line. Even when it looked like we might be diverging from the trend due to some natural variability, the variability ended and we were right back on the line. AGW has easily trumped variability the last 3 decades once you take out ENSO and TSI.

 

(There are two years that vary by more than .1 -1981 and 1982 - 1982 is due to El Chichon which I didn't adjust for, not sure about 1981.)