A Little Known Prediction by Judith Lean and David Rind

[Snow_Miser]

Judith Lean and David Rind are two very well respected atmospheric scientists whom have published much research on Climate Change. In 2009, they published a paper in Geophysical Research Letters, titled: "How will Earth's Surface Temperature Change in Future Decades?"

 

http://www.environmentportal.in/files/Earth%20surface%20temperature.pdf

 

The paper is available in the link above. In the paper, they assumed Solar Irradiance, Volcanism, and El Nino were natural modulators of the overall anthropogenic long term trend upward. Based off of this, with the solar maximum in 2014, the temperatures should have increased by 0.15 Degrees C +/-0.03 Degrees C by 2014 from 2009. This was a forecast with high confidence, given the low error margins. Let's see how this forecast has done so far.

 

http://woodfortrees.org/graph/wti/from:2009/last:2013/trend/plot/gistemp/from:2009/last:2013/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:2009/last:2013/trend/plot/rss/from:2009/last:2013/trend/plot/uah/from:2009/last:2013/trend

 

We can see that in the chart above, all of the datasets are in agreement that there was actually around a 0.1 Decrease in temperatures from 2009 to March 2013. While it is not quite 2014 yet, it is incredibly unlikely that we will see such positive anomalies over the next 9 months to see their predictions verified. That leads to some very important questions. Why was the prediction so wrong? What did they not account for? Did they underestimate the solar role? Did they underestimate ENSO? Did they overestimate the role of the anthropogenic forcing in the trend upward during this period? Why would they give such a high confidence to a forecast that turned out to be well out of their confidence range?

 

Discuss.

[ORH_wxman]

I haven't had time to go through the whole paper, but immediately two things are strange for predicting that type of increase from a 2009 perspective:

 

1.) We were right near the solar min at that point and doesn't most peer review evidence point to about a 2 year lag between solar min and sfc temp min?

2.) We were going into an El Nino in 2009 that was fairly well predicted given the multi-year La Nina we had just come off of. So the temperature was going to be starting from a high point. I'm not sure how much they factored this in though...perhaps if they had written most of the paper in early or mid 2008, then they wouldn't have seen the El Nino coming.

[AvantHiatus]

Is it really worth targeting small details in the climate system and critiquing every failed research paper? We know that the Earth can cool or warm within predominantly warm or cold climate temperature trends, based on a myriad of factors such as teleconnections, volcanic eruptions, and solar activity.

 

Notable cooling periods that appear are the 1940's to the 1960's and the early 1990's. The temperature trends also correlate with the Pacific Decadal Oscillation.

 

 

 

 

[Snow_Miser]

I haven't had time to go through the whole paper, but immediately two things are strange for predicting that type of increase from a 2009 perspective:

 

1.) We were right near the solar min at that point and doesn't most peer review evidence point to about a 2 year lag between solar min and sfc temp min?

2.) We were going into an El Nino in 2009 that was fairly well predicted given the multi-year La Nina we had just come off of. So the temperature was going to be starting from a high point. I'm not sure how much they factored this in though...perhaps if they had written most of the paper in early or mid 2008, then they wouldn't have seen the El Nino coming.

 

I think it's likely a combination of things.

 

1) They did not include the effects of a multidecadal oceanic oscillation. They only included ENSO. There are many papers that document that a significant part of the late-20th Century Warming was likely induced by multidecadal oscillations. For example, Wu et al. 2011 estimated that roughly a third of the warming could be a consequence of natural variability stemming from the PDO/AMO. Mochizuki et al. 2010 also came to the same conclusion that the PDO significantly modulates the long term warming trend.

 

From Mochizuki et al.:

 

Our results suggest that the PDO also plays a major role in modulating the global warming trend on decadal timescales.

 

Given the evidence for a pretty stark correlation between the PDO and the rate of Global Warming, I'm unsure why an oscillation like this wasn't included in their analysis.

 

2) They underestimated the solar contribution and overestimated the anthropogenic contribution. Echer et al. 2012 shows that there is a significant solar signal in the overall 20th Century Warming trend and that the 22 year solar cycle (Hale Cycle) has a more substantial impact on Earth's Climate than the 11 year cycle, or Schwabe Cycle.

 

From Echer et al. 2012:

 

The air surface temperature is a basic meteorological parameter and its variation is a primary measure of global, regional and local climate changes. In this work, the global, hemispheric and latitudinal averaged air surface temperature time series, obtained from the NASA/Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), and the Sunspot Number (R_z) for the interval 1880–2005, are decomposed in frequency bands through wavelet multi-resolution analysis. We have found a very low correlation between global, hemispheric and latitudinal averaged air surface temperature and R_z in the 11 yr solar cycle band (8–16 years) from ∼1880 to ∼1950. Afterwards the correlation is higher. A very significant correlation (R ∼0.57 to 0.80) is found in the ∼22 yr solar Hale cycle band (16–32 years) with lags from zero to four years between latitudinal averages air surface temperature and R_z. Therefore it seems that the 22 yr magnetic field solar cycle might have a higher effect on Earth's climate than solar variations related to the 11 yr sunspot cycle.

 

The sun has contributed significantly to the long term increase in temperatures over the 20th Century. Whether it's 33% or 50%, or 79% is unknown. However, there is a lot of evidence for a solar modulation of temperatures on a hemispheric and on a Global scale.

 

For example, Chen et al. 2006 wrote,

 

These results may indicate that the main factor responsible for tree ring variability

is solar activity. The solar activity has a visible

influence on the behavior of PDO and GSATA.

 

Equilibrium is definitely another factor to consider, but how fast the Earth equilibriates to a forcing is relatively uncertain. It is pretty likely that there are lags in the climate system, but how much of a lag is where there is uncertainty. It should also be stated that a lower climate sensitivity will give a faster equilibrium in the Climate System, whereas a Higher Sensitivity will have a longer equilibrium in the Climate System.

 

[Snow_Miser]

Is it really worth targeting small details in the climate system and critiquing every failed research paper? We know that the Earth can cool or warm within predominantly warm or cold climate temperature trends, based on a myriad of factors such as teleconnections, volcanic eruptions, and solar activity.

 

Notable cooling periods that appear are the 1940's to the 1960's and the early 1990's. The temperature trends also correlate with the Pacific Decadal Oscillation.

 

It is worth looking at, because finding out why the prediction did not come to fruition will improve our knowledge on the Climate System, and may enhance our level of Climate predictability.  

 

Solar Activity has likely contributed significantly to the long term warming trend during the 20th Century. I'm glad you agree that these oscillations modulate temperatures on a multidecadal timeframe. There are some who will claim that these oscillations have little to no effect on temperature changes without any basis.

[ORH_wxman]

Solar probably hasn't produced more than 0.2C of the warming in the 20th century.

 

But my remarks had to do with solar min to solar peak and the lag. Its about 2 years so their analysis seems a bit strange for rising temps considering the solar min was occurring in 2008-2009...so the lag would suggest a bit of cooling through 2011 or even 2012 since the solar min was sluggish to wake up.

[Snow_Miser]

Solar probably hasn't produced more than 0.2C of the warming in the 20th century.

 

But my remarks had to do with solar min to solar peak and the lag. Its about 2 years so their analysis seems a bit strange for rising temps considering the solar min was occurring in 2008-2009...so the lag would suggest a bit of cooling through 2011 or even 2012 since the solar min was sluggish to wake up.

 

I've read papers that have found lags between solar activity and temperature that have found considerable long term lags between solar activity and temperature, and others that claim the climatic response to solar activity is instantaneous. It's very uncertain though.

 

I do disagree with your first statement though. I think the balance of evidence suggests a pretty significant solar contribution to Global Warming. Not sure if it's greater than 50% or not, but I would bet it's more than 0.2 Degrees C.

 

For example, in Reichel et al. 2001, they write:

 

It has previously been demonstrated that the mean land air temperature of the Northern Hemisphere could adequately be associated with a long-term variation of solar activity as given by the length of the approximately 11-year solar cycle. In this paper it is shown that the right cause-and-effect ordering, in the sense of Granger causality, is present between the smoothed solar cycle length and the cycle mean of Northern Hemisphere land air temperature for the twentieth century, at the 99% significance level. This indicates the existence of a physical mechanism linking solar activity to climate variations.

[skierinvermont]

I'm not even going to bother addressing SLs usual solar diatribe that I have debunked many times and which relies upon obscure poorly or not reviewed at all research. There is no support for this in the literature which finds nearly zero net solar forcing from 1900 to present. 

 

I will address the criticism of the paper, which SL has misrepresented.

 

The paper finds that warming from 2009-2014 would be .15C due to solar+anthropogenic forcings, but specifically note that such a trend would be modulated by ENSO. Which is exactly what occurred. 2009 was a strong El Nino. SLs failure to even mention the fact that 2009 was a strong Nino followed by Ninas and neutrals shows he is just a troll. Instead of even mentioning this obvious explanation, he immediately claims proof for his fantastical PDO and solar delusions. It's just pure dishonesty and should be ignored.

 

When we remove ENSO from the analysis, as Lean and Rind do in the paper, we still do not find rapid warming. I find very slight warming of perhaps .01 or .02C. My analysis only goes through 2012 however, and solar activity was just starting to get to moderate levels by 2012. The first 3 months of 2013 are looking pretty warm, even after ENSO adjusting. If 2013 continues like this, and 2014 does as well, then Lean and Rind may end up being right.

 

 

The only flaw I see in their analysis is they assume the current solar cycle will be as strong as the last, which so far it is not shaping up to be. The max of this solar cycle will probably not be much more than half of the last cycle. If they had known that and factored it in, it would probably shave off about .05C from their prediction of .15C increase.

 

Conclusion: ENSO adjusted temps from 2009-2012 rose very little, but there are still two more years to see the expected .1C increase. We might make it, it's hard to tell at this point.

 

If not, then the lack of warming would need another explanation. Possibly the recent increase in east asian aerosols the effect of which is not fully known, or possibly deep ocean storage of heat.

 

 

You can also reference my thread on ENSO, TSI, and Pinatubo adjusted temps here:

 

http://www.americanwx.com/bb/index.php/topic/38887-adjusting-global-temperature-for-oni-tsi-and-pinatubo/

 

 

When one only adjusts for ENSO according to the method in the above link the temps 2009-2012 were as follows (GISS, Had4, NCDC average):

 

2009: .20

2010: .20

2011: .22

2012: .20

[Snow_Miser]

I'm not even going to bother addressing SLs usual solar diatribe that I have debunked many times and which relies upon obscure poorly or not reviewed at all research. There is no support for this in the literature which finds nearly zero net solar forcing from 1900 to present. 

 

I will address the criticism of the paper, which SL has misrepresented.

 

The paper finds that warming from 2009-2014 would be .15C due to solar+anthropogenic forcings, but specifically note that such a trend would be modulated by ENSO. Which is exactly what occurred. 2009 was a strong El Nino. SLs failure to even mention the fact that 2009 was a strong Nino followed by Ninas and neutrals shows he is just a troll. Instead of even mentioning this obvious explanation, he immediately claims proof for his fantastical PDO and solar delusions. It's just pure dishonesty and should be ignored.

 

When we remove ENSO from the analysis, as Lean and Rind do in the paper, we still do not find rapid warming. I find very slight warming of perhaps .01 or .02C. My analysis only goes through 2012 however, and solar activity was just starting to get to moderate levels by 2012. The first 3 months of 2013 are looking pretty warm, even after ENSO adjusting. If 2013 continues like this, and 2014 does as well, then Lean and Rind may end up being right.

 

 

The only flaw I see in their analysis is they assume the current solar cycle will be as strong as the last, which so far it is not shaping up to be. The max of this solar cycle will probably not be much more than half of the last cycle. If they had known that and factored it in, it would probably shave off about .05C from their prediction of .15C increase.

 

Conclusion: ENSO adjusted temps from 2009-2012 rose very little, but there are still two more years to see the expected .1C increase. We might make it, it's hard to tell at this point.

 

If not, then the lack of warming would need another explanation. Possibly the recent increase in east asian aerosols the effect of which is not fully known, or possibly deep ocean storage of heat.

 

 

You can also reference my thread on ENSO, TSI, and Pinatubo adjusted temps here:

 

http://www.americanwx.com/bb/index.php/topic/38887-adjusting-global-temperature-for-oni-tsi-and-pinatubo/

 

 

When one only adjusts for ENSO according to the method in the above link the temps 2009-2012 were as follows (GISS, Had4, NCDC average):

 

2009: .20

2010: .20

2011: .22

2012: .20

 

Skier is not honest when he claims that I have relied on obscure and non peer reviewed research and he knows it. His idea of debunking a paper is to claim that the data within the paper was made up and leave it at that, ignoring the fact that the paper was published and reviewed in a scientific journal. He isn't able to provide an example of where I cited a paper that was not peer reviewed, because there never was an example. Also, if Skier did an objective search of the role of Solar Activity on Global Warming he would see that there are a lot of papers which support a significant solar component to the 20th Century Warming. I've posted several up above, all peer reviewed, and I'm happy to provide more examples if he desires.

 

He is also completely incorrect when he says that 2009 was a strong El Nino year.

 

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2012/13

 

From the link above:

 

In the most recent version of the dataset, using the newer base period methodology, 2006 and 2009 are now classified as La Niña years. The global average temperature in both 2006 and 2009 was 0.02°C (0.04°F) higher than 2012, making these two years the warmest La Niña years on record. NCDC has updated (via strikeout) our Annual Global Climate report to reflect the most current CPC ONI dataset.

 

Skier also didn't mention that the criteria for an El Nino/La Nina year is based off of this, from the same link above:

 

NCDC's criteria is defined as when the first three months of a calendar year meet the La Niña or El Niño threshold as defined by NOAA Climate Prediction Center's (CPC) Oceanic Niño Index (ONI).

 

Looking at the data from the CPC, we can see that 2010 was a Nino year, 2011 and 2012 were weak to moderate La Nina years, and 2013 is a neutral year. Skier's claim that 2009 was a Strong El Nino year is flat out wrong.

 

This is Skier's graph which has removed ENSO, TSI, and Volcanism that he is alluding to:

 

http://www.americanwx.com/bb/index.php?app=core&module=attach&section=attach&attach_rel_module=post&attach_id=85271

 

We can see that even with removing ENSO, we see a flat line over the last 8 years, and a sharp decline from 2009-present of roughly around 0.1 Degrees C, consistent with the decrease in temperature from 2009-present that I cited above from the temperature datasets without removing ENSO. We can also see this cooling trend from 2009-present that Lean and Rind did not accurately predict when removing all of the factors above, plus a 1 year lag for TSI in Skier's analysis in this chart here:

 

http://www.americanwx.com/bb/uploads/monthly_01_2013/post-480-0-67054600-1358560869.png

 

ENSO did not cause the discrepancy between the Lean and Rind prediction and observations, and Skier's own graphs show this. Thus, the question still remains; what was the cause of such a discrepancy between the observed temperature change versus the predicted temperature change?

 

Skier also likes to cite the common advocate argument that the reason for the discrepency is because of aerosols and the mixing of heat down to the deep ocean. We don't know if any of those arguments are correct or not, because we don't know enough about the climate system to determine what is causing the discrepancy.

 

Skier's post above contained multiple errors in it, and he should retract several claims that I've shown to be false.

[The_Global_Warmer]

Solar probably hasn't produced more than 0.2C of the warming in the 20th century.

 

But my remarks had to do with solar min to solar peak and the lag. Its about 2 years so their analysis seems a bit strange for rising temps considering the solar min was occurring in 2008-2009...so the lag would suggest a bit of cooling through 2011 or even 2012 since the solar min was sluggish to wake up.

 

 

And it hasn't really woken up and probably isn't going to.

 

Shouldn't there be more cooling from the discrepancy between the max vs the previous one?

 

[skierinvermont]

Skier is not honest when he claims that I have relied on obscure and non peer reviewed research and he knows it. His idea of debunking a paper is to claim that the data within the paper was made up and leave it at that, ignoring the fact that the paper was published and reviewed in a scientific journal. He isn't able to provide an example of where I cited a paper that was not peer reviewed, because there never was an example. Also, if Skier did an objective search of the role of Solar Activity on Global Warming he would see that there are a lot of papers which support a significant solar component to the 20th Century Warming. I've posted several up above, all peer reviewed, and I'm happy to provide more examples if he desires.

 

He is also completely incorrect when he says that 2009 was a strong El Nino year.

 

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2012/13

 

From the link above:

 

In the most recent version of the dataset, using the newer base period methodology, 2006 and 2009 are now classified as La Niña years. The global average temperature in both 2006 and 2009 was 0.02°C (0.04°F) higher than 2012, making these two years the warmest La Niña years on record. NCDC has updated (via strikeout) our Annual Global Climate report to reflect the most current CPC ONI dataset.

 

Skier also didn't mention that the criteria for an El Nino/La Nina year is based off of this, from the same link above:

 

NCDC's criteria is defined as when the first three months of a calendar year meet the La Niña or El Niño threshold as defined by NOAA Climate Prediction Center's (CPC) Oceanic Niño Index (ONI).

 

Looking at the data from the CPC, we can see that 2010 was a Nino year, 2011 and 2012 were weak to moderate La Nina years, and 2013 is a neutral year. Skier's claim that 2009 was a Strong El Nino year is flat out wrong.

 

This is Skier's graph which has removed ENSO, TSI, and Volcanism that he is alluding to:

 

http://www.americanwx.com/bb/index.php?app=core&module=attach&section=attach&attach_rel_module=post&attach_id=85271

 

We can see that even with removing ENSO, we see a flat line over the last 8 years, and a sharp decline from 2009-present of roughly around 0.1 Degrees C, consistent with the decrease in temperature from 2009-present that I cited above from the temperature datasets without removing ENSO. We can also see this cooling trend from 2009-present that Lean and Rind did not accurately predict when removing all of the factors above, plus a 1 year lag for TSI in Skier's analysis in this chart here:

 

http://www.americanwx.com/bb/uploads/monthly_01_2013/post-480-0-67054600-1358560869.png

 

ENSO did not cause the discrepancy between the Lean and Rind prediction and observations, and Skier's own graphs show this. Thus, the question still remains; what was the cause of such a discrepancy between the observed temperature change versus the predicted temperature change?

 

Skier also likes to cite the common advocate argument that the reason for the discrepency is because of aerosols and the mixing of heat down to the deep ocean. We don't know if any of those arguments are correct or not, because we don't know enough about the climate system to determine what is causing the discrepancy.

 

Skier's post above contained multiple errors in it, and he should retract several claims that I've shown to be false.

 

 

Skier is not honest when he claims that I have relied on obscure and non peer reviewed research and he knows it. His idea of debunking a paper is to claim that the data within the paper was made up and leave it at that, ignoring the fact that the paper was published and reviewed in a scientific journal. He isn't able to provide an example of where I cited a paper that was not peer reviewed, because there never was an example. Also, if Skier did an objective search of the role of Solar Activity on Global Warming he would see that there are a lot of papers which support a significant solar component to the 20th Century Warming. I've posted several up above, all peer reviewed, and I'm happy to provide more examples if he desires.

 

He is also completely incorrect when he says that 2009 was a strong El Nino year.

 

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2012/13

 

From the link above:

 

In the most recent version of the dataset, using the newer base period methodology, 2006 and 2009 are now classified as La Niña years. The global average temperature in both 2006 and 2009 was 0.02°C (0.04°F) higher than 2012, making these two years the warmest La Niña years on record. NCDC has updated (via strikeout) our Annual Global Climate report to reflect the most current CPC ONI dataset.

 

Skier also didn't mention that the criteria for an El Nino/La Nina year is based off of this, from the same link above:

 

NCDC's criteria is defined as when the first three months of a calendar year meet the La Niña or El Niño threshold as defined by NOAA Climate Prediction Center's (CPC) Oceanic Niño Index (ONI).

 

Looking at the data from the CPC, we can see that 2010 was a Nino year, 2011 and 2012 were weak to moderate La Nina years, and 2013 is a neutral year. Skier's claim that 2009 was a Strong El Nino year is flat out wrong.

 

This is Skier's graph which has removed ENSO, TSI, and Volcanism that he is alluding to:

 

http://www.americanwx.com/bb/index.php?app=core&module=attach&section=attach&attach_rel_module=post&attach_id=85271

 

We can see that even with removing ENSO, we see a flat line over the last 8 years, and a sharp decline from 2009-present of roughly around 0.1 Degrees C, consistent with the decrease in temperature from 2009-present that I cited above from the temperature datasets without removing ENSO. We can also see this cooling trend from 2009-present that Lean and Rind did not accurately predict when removing all of the factors above, plus a 1 year lag for TSI in Skier's analysis in this chart here:

 

http://www.americanwx.com/bb/uploads/monthly_01_2013/post-480-0-67054600-1358560869.png

 

ENSO did not cause the discrepancy between the Lean and Rind prediction and observations, and Skier's own graphs show this. Thus, the question still remains; what was the cause of such a discrepancy between the observed temperature change versus the predicted temperature change?

 

Skier also likes to cite the common advocate argument that the reason for the discrepency is because of aerosols and the mixing of heat down to the deep ocean. We don't know if any of those arguments are correct or not, because we don't know enough about the climate system to determine what is causing the discrepancy.

 

Skier's post above contained multiple errors in it, and he should retract several claims that I've shown to be false.

 

 

DonS has also stated several times on this forum that the data in your Shaviv paper is wrong. There is no magic correlation between global sea level and the solar cycle. The fact that you still cling to this ridiculous and absurd notion shows what a troll you are. I've done the correlation myself with the actual data, and there is no correlation. 

 

When I said "2009 was a strong El Nino year" obviously I was making a general reference to the strong 09-10 El Nino. NCDCs classifications are not helpful. The last half of 2009 was quite warm because of the El Nino, as was the first half of 2010. The point remains that the reason for cooling is ENTIRELY due to the trend starting in a Nino and ending in a series of Ninas and neutrals. A fact that you completely neglected in your trolling, which ORH, myself, and others have since point out to you. 

 

 

Using a ENSO AND TSI corrected graph to show cooling 2009-present inconsistent with the Lean and Rind paper is again an invalid methodology. The whole point of Lean and Rinds paper was that TSI would cause warming. By "correcting" and thus removing the TSI component of warming, you cannot make a comparison to their prediction which was based on the TSI warming that my graph removes.\

 

You can't even make a basic apples to apples comparison.

 

This is why I provided ENSO ONLY corrected data above through 2012. There is no cooling. There is very slight warming of .01C. As I observed, this is still much less than the .15C of warming that was predicted.

 

Possible reasons include:

 

1) The ENSO correction isn't perfect especially on short time scales.

 

2) There are still 2 more years to go, and even after ENSO correcting I would bet we will be closer to the .15C from Lean and Rind by 2014.

 

3) TSI never got (and is unlikely to get) as high as Lean and Rind projected. 

 

4) Some possible other source of cooling (most probable candidates: deep ocean storage or aerosols)

[PottercountyWXobserver]

I expect global temperatures to remain steady and maybe even slightly cool up until around 2025. Then the warming trend will continue with the +PDO and the active suncycle after 2020. I expect the global anomaly to be around 1.1 or 1.2 by 2060, maybe higher with the complete meltout of sumertime arctic sea ice.

[Snow_Miser]

DonS has also stated several times on this forum that the data in your Shaviv paper is wrong. There is no magic correlation between global sea level and the solar cycle. The fact that you still cling to this ridiculous and absurd notion shows what a troll you are. I've done the correlation myself with the actual data, and there is no correlation.

When I said "2009 was a strong El Nino year" obviously I was making a general reference to the strong 09-10 El Nino. NCDCs classifications are not helpful. The last half of 2009 was quite warm because of the El Nino, as was the first half of 2010. The point remains that the reason for cooling is ENTIRELY due to the trend starting in a Nino and ending in a series of Ninas and neutrals. A fact that you completely neglected in your trolling, which ORH, myself, and others have since point out to you.

Using a ENSO AND TSI corrected graph to show cooling 2009-present inconsistent with the Lean and Rind paper is again an invalid methodology. The whole point of Lean and Rinds paper was that TSI would cause warming. By "correcting" and thus removing the TSI component of warming, you cannot make a comparison to their prediction which was based on the TSI warming that my graph removes.\

You can't even make a basic apples to apples comparison.

This is why I provided ENSO ONLY corrected data above through 2012. There is no cooling. There is very slight warming of .01C. As I observed, this is still much less than the .15C of warming that was predicted.

Possible reasons include:

1) The ENSO correction isn't perfect especially on short time scales.

2) There are still 2 more years to go, and even after ENSO correcting I would bet we will be closer to the .15C from Lean and Rind by 2014.

3) TSI never got (and is unlikely to get) as high as Lean and Rind projected.

4) Some possible other source of cooling (most probable candidates: deep ocean storage or aerosols)

DonS is a very respectable poster on this board, but his explaination does not make much sense when trying to explain the observation. His claim was that the anthropogenic forcing was responsible for the reason why the total forcing observed during the solar cycle was aroun ld seven times greater than the TSI forcing alone. The fact that you have to resort to a completely bogus theory that the scientist manipulated the data shows how desperate you are to dismiss any piece of evidence that is counter to your stark viewpoint.

I've already explained this to you many times, but you resort to the same old argument that the scientist manipulated the data regardless of how unlikely that possibility may be. You should be ashamed of arguing that on a science board, and pretending that this is what has actually happened.

DonS claimed that the reason why there was a negative forcing that was seven times greater than the TSI forcing over the course of the solar cycle maximum to the solar cycle minimum was because of ocean cycles. This argument may be possible, but there is no evidence to suggest that ocean cycles are in sync with the 11 year Schwabe cycle. Thus, the most likely candidate for this observation is that there is an indirect solar forcing. Why you resort to proclaiming that the scientist manipulated the data instead of even considering the possibility that the data may be correct, since it was published in one of the American Geophysical Union Journals is beyond me.

You also should know what classifies as an El Niño and La Nina year before you make false claims about basic information. The La Nina in the beginning of 2009 likely made it cooler in the beginning of the year, then the developing Niño later in the year warmed things up into 2009.

The main reason for why we should have warmed dramatically from 2009 to 2014 is because of the anthropogenic forcing combined with solar irradiance increasing slightly. You claim that ENSO is largely responsible for the discrepancy between observations and forecasts. Why do you think Lean and Rind had such a high confidence level given the unpredictable nature of ENSO? You are correct that ENSO has contributed to the cooling and that I made a previous illogical comparison with your charts. However, I'm skeptical that ENSO is the primary factor with the discrepancy. There is currently around a 0.25 degree C discrepancy between the observer temperature changes and the predicted temperature changes. This seems too high to be explained by ENSO alone. If the negative trend in ENSO is related to the -PDO, then it would provide support to my hypothesis that since they did not include the PDO in their analysis, they predicted too much warming. They also have likely underestimated the role of the sun given the fact that there is a solar signature in the 20th century temperature record documented on many papers.

In their prediction, Lean and Rind stated that from 2009-2014 should warm 0.15 degrees C. It's unclear if they were referring to the beginning of 2014, or 2014 as a whole. Regardless, it seems far more likely that their prediction will not come to fruition given that there is nearly a 0.3 degree c discrepancy between their prediction and reality. There is something that they did not account for. Be it the role of ENSO, solar activity, the PDO, or aerosols, they did not account for something. Hopefully this prediction will allow for climate scientists to enhance climate predictability based off of this prediction versus reality.

[Snow_Miser]

I expect global temperatures to remain steady and maybe even slightly cool up until around 2025. Then the warming trend will continue with the +PDO and the active suncycle after 2020. I expect the global anomaly to be around 1.1 or 1.2 by 2060, maybe higher with the complete meltout of sumertime arctic sea ice.

So you're predicting a 0.5 degree c temperature increase from now to 2060? A temperature change like that would have no measurable negative impacts to the lay public. I think a prediction like that is reasonable. I think over the next 2-3 decades we are almost certainly going to cool. If we cool a good bit because of the quiet sun, then we can use this as evidence that the sun contributed significantly to the 20th century warming. If not, we can say with certainty that the anthropogenic forcing is dominant. Time will tell.

[The_Global_Warmer]

I expect global temperatures to remain steady and maybe even slightly cool up until around 2025. Then the warming trend will continue with the +PDO and the active suncycle after 2020. I expect the global anomaly to be around 1.1 or 1.2 by 2060, maybe higher with the complete meltout of sumertime arctic sea ice.

 

I doubt they cool during that period.  I would place bets that 2008-2012 will be colder than any other 5 year period.

 

The factors causing the cooling don't have much time left.  We should be in a vigorous cooling period now.  It's pretty obvious the factors for a cool down are battling GHG's.  They both greatly effect smaller feedback's causing variety. 

 

Imagine this period like the late 90s early 2000s of this level of warmth.

 

We have a super weak solar max after the lowest solar min in a century and the -PDO and big Nina's with aerosol's helping but likely not increasing in cooling power compared to the onset of the other two.

 

 

Look at the torching all over the oceans.  It's obviously not widespread and the gray area's might be negative more than positive but smaller than a -5.

 

 

Imagine dropping a raging NINO on that graph.  It would be absurd.  Wait until June and July and the insane Northern Hemisphere sst anomaly's show up.  Like the SOO off Russias Eastern Coast be up to +16C  in May and June above normal.  The Sea's South of Europe will torch.  The Hudson will torch. If it doesn't then somewhere else in the North will be way way way way above normal. 

 

Since 2002 NH SSTA have been abornomally high in summer solar period.  Mostly peaking in August/September when Northern SST's peak torch.  It's become enough to effect the Global SST anomaly's.  If not we would have cooled maybe up to .05 to .10 more than we have globally. 

 

I think global warming has caused this. 

 

This year snow fall is much higher than normal.  Maybe it will off-set this a bit.  but it's already starting in Japan the North Atlantic.

 

Look at the Northern Baffin Bay.  Like really?  How can that even be.  That is very warm water, even if it comes from the South.  So what.  Either way that warm open water will obviously warm up faster than having to warm up at freezing water or ice.  The only thing in Summer keeping these regions from warming radically is the ice. 

 

2013 will be much warmer than 2011 and 2012.  Likely 4th or 5th all time when it's over barring a huge NINA.  Which isn't likely at the moment. 

 

Remember GHG heat trapping get's better every year. 

[Snow_Miser]

I doubt they cool during that period.  I would place bets that 2008-2012 will be colder than any other 5 year period.

 

 

So how would Global Temperatures change over the next 2-3 decades?

 

Should also be noted that the Climate is more sensitive to long term slower changes in Solar Activity rather than short term rapid 11 year cycle changes in Solar Activity.

 

From Zanchettin et al. 2008:

 

Although most of the Sun-climate mechanisms are not well understood yet, a host of empirical evidence suggests that solar energy changes alter the Earth’s climate significantly [Eddy, 1976; Haigh, 1996; Shindell et al., 1999; Marsh and Svensmark, 2003; Lambert et al., 2004; Georgieva et al.,2005] and that climate sensitivity to solar variations obeys a frequency-dependent transfer function of solar energy, so that the damping effect of the oceanic and atmospheric thermal inertia make the climate more sensitive to slower solar variations [Wigley, 1988; Foukal et al., 2004; Scafetta and West, 2006].

[AvantHiatus]

I expect global temperatures to remain steady and maybe even slightly cool up until around 2025. Then the warming trend will continue with the +PDO and the active suncycle after 2020. I expect the global anomaly to be around 1.1 or 1.2 by 2060, maybe higher with the complete meltout of sumertime arctic sea ice.

There is a diminishing cold trend on that informative temperature graph you posted. In other words, each successive cold period becomes shorter and and less severe. I'm with Friv on this one and support despite all these negative factors, the Earth will remain at a steady state and perhaps warm slightly the next few years before rapidly warming at the onset of the next Super El Nino.

 

There is also alot of thermal energy trapped below the surface of the world ocean and I think we are seeing the beginning of a historical transformation in ocean heat anomalies.

[Snow_Miser]

There is a diminishing cold trend on that informative temperature graph you posted. In other words, each successive cold period becomes shorter and and less severe. I'm with Friv on this one and support despite all these negative factors, the Earth will remain at a steady state and perhaps warm slightly the next few years before rapidly warming at the onset of the next Super El Nino.

 

There is also alot of thermal energy trapped below the surface of the world ocean and I think we are seeing the beginning of a historical transformation in ocean heat anomalies.

 

The next decade will be very telling for attribution and climate sensitivity. We'll see. At this point what we're saying about the future is mere speculation. Let's see who is right versus who is wrong.

[Snow_Miser]

After thinking about it, I was correct about saying that ENSO was likely to not be responsible for the observed discrepancy. The reason being is that removing the effects of the solar cycle and ENSO still gave a 0.1 Degree C cooling trend. This means that the net trend from the solar cycle and ENSO according to Skier's analysis should be zero with just the solar irradiance cycle and ENSO alone, since the observed cooling trend from 2009-present is ~0.1 Degrees C. We still observe a 0.1 Degree C cooling trend even with removing ENSO/Solar Irradiance, indicating that the discrepancy is coming from a factor that they have not taken into consideration.

[GaWx]

 I maintain that the jury is still out on how high the solar influence is on global temp.'s when considering things like Q's about past lag of solar activity to global temp.'s, cosmic rays' indirect influence on global temp.'s, etc. I think we'll know a lot more within about the next five years, which would put us at the 10 year mark past the deep min. of the prior cycle and likely on the way to an even quieter min. around 2018-2022. (I'm expecting the current max. period to end around 2015 followed by a plummet of activity.) I still think that there is a lot of uncertainty as regards man's influence on global temp.'s (AGW). I still believe that it is quite possible that a major portion of the late 20th century global warming was caused by the solar influence being that 1950-2000 overall apparently had the highest amount of sunspot activity for any 50 year period going back at least 400 years. Nobody knows for sure where we are headed despite how convinced they may seem to be. It is all still speculation.

[skierinvermont]

DonS is a very respectable poster on this board, but his explaination does not make much sense when trying to explain the observation. His claim was that the anthropogenic forcing was responsible for the reason why the total forcing observed during the solar cycle was aroun ld seven times greater than the TSI forcing alone. The fact that you have to resort to a completely bogus theory that the scientist manipulated the data shows how desperate you are to dismiss any piece of evidence that is counter to your stark viewpoint.

I've already explained this to you many times, but you resort to the same old argument that the scientist manipulated the data regardless of how unlikely that possibility may be. You should be ashamed of arguing that on a science board, and pretending that this is what has actually happened.

DonS claimed that the reason why there was a negative forcing that was seven times greater than the TSI forcing over the course of the solar cycle maximum to the solar cycle minimum was because of ocean cycles. This argument may be possible, but there is no evidence to suggest that ocean cycles are in sync with the 11 year Schwabe cycle. Thus, the most likely candidate for this observation is that there is an indirect solar forcing. Why you resort to proclaiming that the scientist manipulated the data instead of even considering the possibility that the data may be correct, since it was published in one of the American Geophysical Union Journals is beyond me.

You also should know what classifies as an El Niño and La Nina year before you make false claims about basic information. The La Nina in the beginning of 2009 likely made it cooler in the beginning of the year, then the developing Niño later in the year warmed things up into 2009.

The main reason for why we should have warmed dramatically from 2009 to 2014 is because of the anthropogenic forcing combined with solar irradiance increasing slightly. You claim that ENSO is largely responsible for the discrepancy between observations and forecasts. Why do you think Lean and Rind had such a high confidence level given the unpredictable nature of ENSO? You are correct that ENSO has contributed to the cooling and that I made a previous illogical comparison with your charts. However, I'm skeptical that ENSO is the primary factor with the discrepancy. There is currently around a 0.25 degree C discrepancy between the observer temperature changes and the predicted temperature changes. This seems too high to be explained by ENSO alone. If the negative trend in ENSO is related to the -PDO, then it would provide support to my hypothesis that since they did not include the PDO in their analysis, they predicted too much warming. They also have likely underestimated the role of the sun given the fact that there is a solar signature in the 20th century temperature record documented on many papers.

In their prediction, Lean and Rind stated that from 2009-2014 should warm 0.15 degrees C. It's unclear if they were referring to the beginning of 2014, or 2014 as a whole. Regardless, it seems far more likely that their prediction will not come to fruition given that there is nearly a 0.3 degree c discrepancy between their prediction and reality. There is something that they did not account for. Be it the role of ENSO, solar activity, the PDO, or aerosols, they did not account for something. Hopefully this prediction will allow for climate scientists to enhance climate predictability based off of this prediction versus reality.

 

 

Don has also agreed, perhaps you missed it, that no such correlation exists between global sea level and solar cycles. All you have to do is look at a chart of sea level to see that no such correlation exists. You are not going to convince anybody with this argument, because anybody can look at a SLR chart and see there is no 11-yr periodicity. 

 

2) Lean and Rind did not say we will definitely warm .15C in 5 years, they said that ignoring other sources of unpredictability the predictable component of global temperature (solar and AGW) will rise .15C. 

 

3) I didn't say that ENSO explains all of the discrepancy between their prediction and reality. In fact, I said the exact opposite. I said it explains less than half of it. Instead of a cooling of .1C, there is a warming of .01C, which is still .14C discrepancy. I am simply offering a more realistic and fair assessment that doesn't ignore the effect of ENSO. I have offered 4 possible explanations for why there remains a .14C discrepancy 1) ENSO correction isn't perfect esp. on such a short period 2) There are still 2 years to go until 2014 3) TSI wasn't as high as Lean and Rind thought it would be 4) deep ocean heat storage or aerosols

 

4) Your argument that the discrepancy is due to Lean and RInd underestimating solar is illogical and self-contradicting. Lean and Rind assumed, based on well known statistical relationships, that increasing solar activity would increase global temperature. For this, they were actually praised by many skeptics and lukewarmers. If the effect of solar activity is even stronger than they thought, then that would actually mean they should have predicted MORE warming, like .2 or .3C in 5 years, which would have made the discrepancy worse.

 

 

The fact that it hasn't warmed much, despite a return from solar min to solar max, is actually an argument that the solar connections is weaker than that assumed by Lean and Rind. 

[skierinvermont]

The next decade will be very telling for attribution and climate sensitivity. We'll see. At this point what we're saying about the future is mere speculation. Let's see who is right versus who is wrong.

 

That's what you deniers said about the last decade. Mass predictions of rapid global cooling based on the record weak solar cycle. Instead, we've continued to warm (albeit much slower). 

 

Now you're left clinging to magical lags that are physically impossible. You and your denier crowd some how think that nearly a full cycle of record low solar activity isn't a long enough test period. Not only have we not even begun to cool, we've continued to warm. No lag can explain that fact. Even if a lag exists, cooling should have commenced back in 2007. It might have taken the oceans decades to cool off fully, but they should have begun cooling once the sun went dark back in 2007. Instead, the oceans continue to absorb incomprehensibly large quantities of heat. 

[Snow_Miser]

That's what you deniers said about the last decade. Mass predictions of rapid global cooling based on the record weak solar cycle. Instead, we've continued to warm (albeit much slower). 

 

Now you're left clinging to magical lags that are physically impossible. You and your denier crowd some how think that nearly a full cycle of record low solar activity isn't a long enough test period. Not only have we not even begun to cool, we've continued to warm. No lag can explain that fact. Even if a lag exists, cooling should have commenced back in 2007. It might have taken the oceans decades to cool off fully, but they should have begun cooling once the sun went dark back in 2007. Instead, the oceans continue to absorb incomprehensibly large quantities of heat. 

 

I don't think "us deniers" said that about the past decade. There are many factors that have impacted the slowing down in the warming rate. The sun is probably a major factor contributing to that slowing down of the warming rate, and the climate has likely not fully equilibrated to a lower solar output. How long it takes for equilibrium to occur is still not a very well understood issue, since the rate of equilibrium is linked to Climate Sensitivity, a very uncertain issue.

 

You don't think there are lags in the climate system? Really? The average amount of sunlight reaching the Northern Hemisphere is the highest in June, yet the average high temperatures occur 1-2 months later. That's one lag in the climate system that is associated with cyclical annual obliquity changes. Yes, the amount of energy reaching the Earth has declined because of reduced solar activity over the last decade or so, but how long it takes the climate system to respond to that change is uncertain. It's not instantaneous, and it doesn't take forever. It's somewhere in between.

 

Ocean Heat Content changes are generally considered to be a good proxy for the Earth's Energy Imbalance, but the measurements from the NODC dataset are not absolutely sound. The UKMO EN3 OHC dataset has Heat Content decreasing over the last several years. You made a claim that it was due to XTP corrections not being in place (which was not correct) and did not consider the UKMO EN3 dataset to ever be correct. If the UKMO EN3 dataset is correct, then the positive Energy Imbalance has now reversed into a Global negative Energy Imbalance. It all depends on which Heat Content Dataset you use.

[Snow_Miser]

 I maintain that the jury is still out on how high the solar influence is on global temp.'s when considering things like Q's about past lag of solar activity to global temp.'s, cosmic rays' indirect influence on global temp.'s, etc. I think we'll know a lot more within about the next five years, which would put us at the 10 year mark past the deep min. of the prior cycle and likely on the way to an even quieter min. around 2018-2022. (I'm expecting the current max. period to end around 2015 followed by a plummet of activity.) I still think that there is a lot of uncertainty as regards man's influence on global temp.'s (AGW). I still believe that it is quite possible that a major portion of the late 20th century global warming was caused by the solar influence being that 1950-2000 overall apparently had the highest amount of sunspot activity for any 50 year period going back at least 400 years. Nobody knows for sure where we are headed despite how convinced they may seem to be. It is all still speculation.

 

I get called a "denier" because I say that the science isn't as certain as some would like to believe. Excellent post.

[skierinvermont]

I don't think "us deniers" said that about the past decade. There are many factors that have impacted the slowing down in the warming rate. The sun is probably a major factor contributing to that slowing down of the warming rate, and the climate has likely not fully equilibrated to a lower solar output. How long it takes for equilibrium to occur is still not a very well understood issue, since the rate of equilibrium is linked to Climate Sensitivity, a very uncertain issue.

 

You don't think there are lags in the climate system? Really? The average amount of sunlight reaching the Northern Hemisphere is the highest in June, yet the average high temperatures occur 1-2 months later. That's one lag in the climate system that is associated with cyclical annual obliquity changes. Yes, the amount of energy reaching the Earth has declined because of reduced solar activity over the last decade or so, but how long it takes the climate system to respond to that change is uncertain. It's not instantaneous, and it doesn't take forever. It's somewhere in between.

 

Ocean Heat Content changes are generally considered to be a good proxy for the Earth's Energy Imbalance, but the measurements from the NODC dataset are not absolutely sound. The UKMO EN3 OHC dataset has Heat Content decreasing over the last several years. You made a claim that it was due to XTP corrections not being in place (which was not correct) and did not consider the UKMO EN3 dataset to ever be correct. If the UKMO EN3 dataset is correct, then the positive Energy Imbalance has now reversed into a Global negative Energy Imbalance. It all depends on which Heat Content Dataset you use.

 

 

It was not a bias corrected version of OHC data. Tisdale grabbed it off KNMI without a clue which version it was. And it was removed from KNMI shortly thereafter. Download the data from the Met Office directly. 

 

 

Your claim that "it may take some time for earth to equilibriate to lower solar output" is not consistent with tthat the sun may cause cooling. If the earth was cooling, then yes, it might take us some time to see the full power of solar cooling. Instead, the earth continues to warm. 5 years from now we will be even warmer. 10 years even warmer. The earth's energy balance is positive and the sun has not changed that fact.

[Snow_Miser]

Don has also agreed, perhaps you missed it, that no such correlation exists between global sea level and solar cycles. All you have to do is look at a chart of sea level to see that no such correlation exists. You are not going to convince anybody with this argument, because anybody can look at a SLR chart and see there is no 11-yr periodicity. 

 

2) Lean and Rind did not say we will definitely warm .15C in 5 years, they said that ignoring other sources of unpredictability the predictable component of global temperature (solar and AGW) will rise .15C. 

 

3) I didn't say that ENSO explains all of the discrepancy between their prediction and reality. In fact, I said the exact opposite. I said it explains less than half of it. Instead of a cooling of .1C, there is a warming of .01C, which is still .14C discrepancy. I am simply offering a more realistic and fair assessment that doesn't ignore the effect of ENSO. I have offered 4 possible explanations for why there remains a .14C discrepancy 1) ENSO correction isn't perfect esp. on such a short period 2) There are still 2 years to go until 2014 3) TSI wasn't as high as Lean and Rind thought it would be 4) deep ocean heat storage or aerosols

 

4) Your argument that the discrepancy is due to Lean and RInd underestimating solar is illogical and self-contradicting. Lean and Rind assumed, based on well known statistical relationships, that increasing solar activity would increase global temperature. For this, they were actually praised by many skeptics and lukewarmers. If the effect of solar activity is even stronger than they thought, then that would actually mean they should have predicted MORE warming, like .2 or .3C in 5 years, which would have made the discrepancy worse.

 

 

The fact that it hasn't warmed much, despite a return from solar min to solar max, is actually an argument that the solar connections is weaker than that assumed by Lean and Rind. 

 

You are really scrutinizing on the Sea Level part of the paper and failed to even consider any of the other variables Shaviv considered in his paper. All you had to do was read the abstract.

 

Over the 11-year solar cycle, small changes in the total solar irradiance (TSI) give rise to small variations in the global energy budget. It was suggested, however, that different mechanisms could amplify solar activity variations to give large climatic effects, a possibility which is still a subject of debate. With this in mind, we use the oceans as a calorimeter to measure the radiative forcing variations associated with the solar cycle. This is achieved through the study of three independent records, the net heat flux into the oceans over 5 decades, the sea-level change rate based on tide gauge records over the 20th century, and the sea-surface temperature variations. Each of the records can be used to consistently derive the same oceanic heat flux. We find that the total radiative forcing associated with solar cycles variations is about 5 to 7 times larger than just those associated with the TSI variations, thus implying the necessary existence of an amplification mechanism, although without pointing to which one.

Evidently you seemed to have missed that.

 

You also missed the caption that went along with Figure 6 in the paper; the one you claim was "manipulated."

 

Read it carefully.

 

Sea Level vs. Solar Activity. Sea level change rate over the 20th century is based on 24 tide gauges previously chosen by Douglas [1997] for the stringent criteria they satisfy (solid line, with 1- error range denoted with the shaded region). The rates are compared with the total solar irradiance variations Lean [2000] (dashed line, with the secular trends removed). Here r = 0.54 giving a p = 10−4 (for Neff = 47). The inset depicts the sea level change rate folded over the solar cycle together with a sinusoidal least 2 fit (each year is assigned a phase relative to the preceding and following solar minima, after which all data

points within a phase bin are averaged; the data is then shown twice, over two cycles, for clarity). The tide gauge data leads the solar forcing by 3±6 months. The Inset also depicts the TOPEX / Jason satellite based sea level change rate overlaid on the solar-cycle folded tide-gauge data. Besides the large 1997 El-Ni˜no event, the two different data sets are consistent with each other.

 

I found it pretty comical when you claimed that Douglas 1997 was an obscure "denier" study without bothering to check the facts out for yourself before you made such a false claim.

 

2) They gave very low error margins, indicating that they had a very high degree level of confidence in their forecast. Looking at your own analysis, the one that took out TSI, ENSO, and Volcanism, we can see that taking out all of these variables still gave a downward slope since 2009 of roughly 0.1 Degrees C. Thus, it can be assumed that the warming effect of TSI variations was countered by the cooling effect of ENSO, since Volcanism was not a real factor during this timeframe. Something else caused this 0.25 Degree C discrepancy present. It could be the underestimated indirect solar forcing (like through Clouds, UV etc.) or it could be through the PDO/AMO.

 

3) Again, removing ENSO and Solar Irradiance still gives a 0.1 Degree C cooling trend. This means that the cooling effect of ENSO was countered by the warming effect of the Solar Irradiance, since we observed a 0.1 Degree C cooling trend with, and without removing any factors in the observational datasets. I think you're overestimating the role of ENSO in this cooling trend and underestimating other factors.

 

4) What I mean is that they underestimated the role of long term solar changes. The Earth is more sensitive to slow long term changes than rapid short term changes. That's why I posted the quote from Zanchettin et al. in my previous post:

 

From Zanchettin et al. 2008:

 

Although most of the Sun-climate mechanisms are not well understood yet, a host of empirical evidence suggests that solar energy changes alter the Earth’s climate significantly [Eddy, 1976; Haigh, 1996; Shindell et al., 1999; Marsh and Svensmark, 2003; Lambert et al., 2004; Georgieva et al.,2005] and that climate sensitivity to solar variations obeys a frequency-dependent transfer function of solar energy, so that the damping effect of the oceanic and atmospheric thermal inertia make the climate more sensitive to slower solar variations [Wigley, 1988; Foukal et al., 2004; Scafetta and West, 2006].

[Snow_Miser]

It was not a bias corrected version of OHC data. Tisdale grabbed it off KNMI without a clue where it had come from. And it was removed from KNMI shortly thereafter.

 

 

Your claim that "it may take some time for earth to equilibriate to lower solar output" is not consistent with tthat the sun may cause cooling. If the earth was cooling, then yes, it might take us some time to see the full power of solar cooling. Instead, the earth continues to warm. 5 years from now we will be even warmer. 10 years even warmer. The earth's energy balance is positive and the sun has not changed that fact.

 

You're assuming that the climate had already equilibrated to a higher solar output in the late-20th Century, so thus you assume that the cooling effect is instantaneous, which may not be the case.

 

I think we can say with certainty that the sun is no longer having a warming influence, and has not equilibrated to the cooling influence. How much of a cooling influence it is now having and whether that cooling influence will grow over the next decade is still under debate.

[skierinvermont]

You're assuming that the climate had already equilibrated to a higher solar output in the late-20th Century, so thus you assume that the cooling effect is instantaneous, which may not be the case.

 

I think we can say with certainty that the sun is no longer having a warming influence, and has not equilibrated to the cooling influence. How much of a cooling influence it is now having and whether that cooling influence will grow over the next decade is still under debate.

 

No it does not assume that. We have returned to early 20th century solar activity. If solar activity in the late 20th century were responsible for the warming, then a return to early 20th century solar activity would cause an immediate cooling trend. It could take several decades to reach full cooling. But cooling would commence immediately once solar activity was returned to the very low values of the early 20th century (and present). 

 

If solar activity had only gone down a little bit, then yes, we could continue to warm if we had not yet reached equilibrium. Solar forcing would have to remain above the equilibrium value, however. Given we are at record low solar activity, and yet rapid warming continues, it is obviously having only a small effect. 

 

 

Say solar activity ranges on a scale of 1-10. We started the 20th century at a 1, and ended at a 10. Maybe temperature didn't quite equilibriate yet, and only got to a 6. Well solar activity is back down to a 1 or 2, which is still much less than a 6, which means the earth should be cooling. And yet, rapid warming continues. 

[skierinvermont]

There is not a .25C discrepancy. There is a .14C discrepancy, with 2 more years to go for warming to occur.

 

 

The fact that you cannot understand this shows just what a troll you are.

 

 

Their "projection" was based off TSI and AGW. Thus, other factors that were not included like ENSO, or if a big volcano happened, should be removed.

 

When those factors are removed, there was .01C of warming, with 2 more years to go for additional warming to occur. 

 

 

This is a .14C discrepancy. This is very basic. Please stop falsely claiming a .25 or nearly .3C discrepancy. That is a lie. 

[Snow_Miser]

There is not a .25C discrepancy. There is a .14C discrepancy, with 2 more years to go for warming to occur.

 

 

The fact that you cannot understand this shows just what a troll you are.

 

 

Their "projection" was based off TSI and AGW. Thus, other factors that were not included like ENSO, or if a big volcano happened, should be removed.

 

When those factors are removed, there was .01C of warming, with 2 more years to go for additional warming to occur. 

 

 

This is a .14C discrepancy. This is very basic. Please stop falsely claiming a .25 or nearly .3C discrepancy. That is a lie. 

 

I see what you are saying now. You are correct. Apologies for the misunderstanding. Still, that leaves the question of what was the cause of the remaining discrepancy?