2011 Global Temperatures

[tacoman25]

Well as long as we all agree that the proper way to grade them going forward is using HadCRUT w/ UAH poles, or to only compare them between 60S and 60N.

And using either of those two metrics, there has never been a divergence that lasted longer than 15 years. And I see no reason that there will be going forward.

Ice retreating from a shore earlier in the year is going to make the coastal station skyrocket, but it's also going to make the air over water skyrocket because there used to be ice there.

Before 2005, there was never a record warm year with one source but not with the other three. Since then, there have been three.

[tacoman25]

In the long run it does not diverge from HadCRUT or from HadCRUT +UAH infilling over the last 15-30 years.

We are talking about the past decade. There is evidence that the trends from the past 20-30 years do not necessarily apply to what is going on now.

[ORH_wxman]

Well as long as we all agree that the proper way to grade them going forward is using HadCRUT w/ UAH poles, or to only compare them between 60S and 60N. Comparing to HadCRUT directly doesn't make much sense since HadCRUT leaves the poles blank. And comparing to UAH or RSS doesn't make much sense since they are likely biased too cold and are not measuring the same thing anyways.

And using either of those two metrics, there has never been a divergence that lasted longer than 15 years. And I see no reason that there will be going forward.

Ice retreating from a shore earlier in the year is going to make the coastal station skyrocket, but it's also going to make the air over water skyrocket because there used to be ice there. Or a month later, say by July, the coastal station won't be that anomalous because the ice has usually melted out near the coast, but the air farther offshore will be really anomalous because usually it is frozen.

I think its fair game to judge them since we started going to into the next cool phase. GISS has made retroactive adjustments to cool the previous warm phase in the 1930s/1940s. If GISS continues to run warm as we go deeper into this current cooling ocean cycle, then its certainly worthy of criticism.

As for your explanation over the ocean, the ocean anomaly should be slower to respond...and it doesn't explain for areas that only see a very brief loss of sea ice. Those anomalies should be fairly minimal.

But we'll see. We'll have our answer I think over the next 5 years IMHO. If GISS continues to diverge, then I think there is a legit issue with its methods.

[nzucker]

Zucker is just blanket blaming the process of extrapolation, which is just a failure to understand the math involved. Numerous studies have shown that the process of extrapolation doesn't create a bias. You can form an accurate index of global temperature using as little as 70 stations and extrapolating 1000s of KM between them. The number of stations GISS uses is extraneous.

First of all, I am not just attacking extrapolation: there are stations in Greenland that GISS uses that must be showing a very high warm anomaly for March 2011 in areas that the satellites are detecting as much colder than normal. What is causing this deviation, which is up to 6C in places like North-Central Greenland where RSS has filled in the pink whereas GISS has the medium red? How can two sources measuring almost exactly the same thing have such a large temperature difference? I have to wonder if GISS stations are poorly sited, contaminated with UHI (sometimes hard to avoid in such a remote area like the Arctic where any settlement probably disturbs the climate subtly), or in coastal areas that have warmed more. But even these factors, especially when accounting for the fact that they have tried to take out UHI contamination, can't explain such large discrepancies. What is going on up there?

Also, your "extrapolated index of global temperatures" is NOT what GISS does. The stations are not equal distances apart, they are not equally distributed between rural/populated settings, and extrapolations are not made in all areas equally. Some areas get extrapolated more than others, and the maps this year have shown the most extreme anomalies in those areas. Even if we accept Will's argument that GISS is too high because it misses the stability of the oceans, that still doesn't explain how a place like Greenland got so warm. I don't think you can say that selective extrapolation is the same as generalized extrapolation because it probably involves more luck in the short term, which is what is causing the problem.

In the long run it does not diverge from HadCRUT or from HadCRUT +UAH infilling over the last 15-30 years.

No one is talking about the last thirty years. We are talking about now. There is nearly a .3C divergence in GISS versus the satellites in March 2011; this is an exaggerated version of a trend that has become all too apparent in the last couple of years. Everyone but you is trying to find out why this is happening...your argument is "well it didn't happen in the past." That doesn't answer the question, Andrew. It's a mysterious question because the lower troposphere is supposed to be warming faster than the Earth's surface, so the fact that the opposite tendency is occurring to an increasing extent merits investigation. I don't know why you're so hung up on what happened 30 years ago...

[BethesdaWX]

First of all, I am not just attacking extrapolation: there are stations in Greenland that GISS uses that must be showing a very high warm anomaly for March 2011 in areas that the satellites are detecting as much colder than normal. What is causing this deviation, which is up to 6C in places like North-Central Greenland where RSS has filled in the pink whereas GISS has the medium red? How can two sources measuring almost exactly the same thing have such a large temperature difference? I have to wonder if GISS stations are poorly sited, contaminated with UHI (sometimes hard to avoid in such a remote area like the Arctic where any settlement probably disturbs the climate subtly), or in coastal areas that have warmed more. But even these factors, especially when accounting for the fact that they have tried to take out UHI contamination, can't explain such large discrepancies. What is going on up there?

Also, your "extrapolated index of global temperatures" is NOT what GISS does. The stations are not equal distances apart, they are not equally distributed between rural/populated settings, and extrapolations are not made in all areas equally. Some areas get extrapolated more than others, and the maps this year have shown the most extreme anomalies in those areas. Even if we accept Will's argument that GISS is too high because it misses the stability of the oceans, that still doesn't explain how a place like Greenland got so warm. I don't think you can say that selective extrapolation is the same as generalized extrapolation because it probably involves more luck in the short term, which is what is causing the problem.

No one is talking about the last thirty years. We are talking about now. There is nearly a .3C divergence in GISS versus the satellites in March 2011; this is an exaggerated version of a trend that has become all too apparent in the last couple of years. Everyone but you is trying to find out why this is happening...your argument is "well it didn't happen in the past." That doesn't answer the question, Andrew. It's a mysterious question because the lower troposphere is supposed to be warming faster than the Earth's surface, so the fact that the opposite tendency is occurring to an increasing extent merits investigation. I don't know why you're so hung up on what happened 30 years ago...

Yeah, a 5-6C difference over greenland? Thats absurd.

[skierinvermont]

First of all, I am not just attacking extrapolation: there are stations in Greenland that GISS uses that must be showing a very high warm anomaly for March 2011 in areas that the satellites are detecting as much colder than normal. What is causing this deviation, which is up to 6C in places like North-Central Greenland where RSS has filled in the pink whereas GISS has the medium red? How can two sources measuring almost exactly the same thing have such a large temperature difference? I have to wonder if GISS stations are poorly sited, contaminated with UHI (sometimes hard to avoid in such a remote area like the Arctic where any settlement probably disturbs the climate subtly), or in coastal areas that have warmed more. But even these factors, especially when accounting for the fact that they have tried to take out UHI contamination, can't explain such large discrepancies. What is going on up there?

Also, your "extrapolated index of global temperatures" is NOT what GISS does. The stations are not equal distances apart, they are not equally distributed between rural/populated settings, and extrapolations are not made in all areas equally. Some areas get extrapolated more than others, and the maps this year have shown the most extreme anomalies in those areas. Even if we accept Will's argument that GISS is too high because it misses the stability of the oceans, that still doesn't explain how a place like Greenland got so warm. I don't think you can say that selective extrapolation is the same as generalized extrapolation because it probably involves more luck in the short term, which is what is causing the problem.

No one is talking about the last thirty years. We are talking about now. There is nearly a .3C divergence in GISS versus the satellites in March 2011; this is an exaggerated version of a trend that has become all too apparent in the last couple of years. Everyone but you is trying to find out why this is happening...your argument is "well it didn't happen in the past." That doesn't answer the question, Andrew. It's a mysterious question because the lower troposphere is supposed to be warming faster than the Earth's surface, so the fact that the opposite tendency is occurring to an increasing extent merits investigation. I don't know why you're so hung up on what happened 30 years ago...

As I've explained several times, you can form an accurate index of global temperatures using 70 UNEQUALLY spaced stations.

The only way extrapolation creates a bias is if the GISS staions have warmed faster than the areas they extrapolate to. Pick an individual station. I have no reason to believe an individual station has warmed faster than the area around it. Sometimes it will have warmed faster than the area around. Sometimes it will have warmed slower. It balances out.

I'm not wondering why GISS has diverged in recent years because I know why. Over the last 8 years it's mostly just luck. GISS warmed slower prior to 2002 between 60S and 60N.. now it is catching up. Over a longer period like 15 or 20 years it's because it includes the arctic. Adding UAH arcitc into HadCRUT removes the divergence. Short term divergences like this have been going on for decades. I have no reason to believe this short term divergence is any different than any of the dozens of others.

There's no divergence long-term between GISS and HadCRUT w/ UAH poles. Over short periods like 8 years sometimes one warms faster than the other. This happens to be one of the periods where GISS warmed faster.

[BethesdaWX]

As I've explained several times, you can form an accurate index of global temperatures using 70 UNEQUALLY spaced stations.

The only way extrapolation creates a bias is if the GISS staions have warmed faster than the areas they extrapolate to. Pick an individual station. I have no reason to believe an individual station has warmed faster than the area around it. Sometimes it will have warmed faster than the area around. Sometimes it will have warmed slower. It balances out.

I'm not wondering why GISS has diverged in recent years because I know why. Over the last 8 years it's mostly just luck. GISS warmed slower prior to 2002 between 60S and 60N.. now it is catching up. Over a longer period like 15 or 20 years it's because it includes the arctic. Adding UAH arcitc into HadCRUT removes the divergence.

There's no divergence long-term between GISS and HadCRUT w/ UAH poles. Over short periods like 8 years sometimes one warms faster than the other. This happens to be one of the periods where GISS warmed faster.

Everyone has explained this to you, and your stupid bias prevents you from thinking.

1) No you cannot if you extrapolate incorrectly...as in, land anoms over ocean! Of course the Land will warm faster than the ocean Mr Numbnut. Holy Moly

2) Infill UAH data into HADCRUT's Blank Data over Africa, Australia, Poles, & south America...not just the poles.

3) GISS has diverged from everyone else for the reasons above.

[tacoman25]

As I've explained several times, you can form an accurate index of global temperatures using 70 UNEQUALLY spaced stations.

The only way extrapolation creates a bias is if the GISS staions have warmed faster than the areas they extrapolate to. Pick an individual station. I have no reason to believe an individual station has warmed faster than the area around it. Sometimes it will have warmed faster than the area around. Sometimes it will have warmed slower. It balances out.

I'm not wondering why GISS has diverged in recent years because I know why. Over the last 8 years it's mostly just luck. GISS warmed slower prior to 2002 between 60S and 60N.. now it is catching up. Over a longer period like 15 or 20 years it's because it includes the arctic. Adding UAH arcitc into HadCRUT removes the divergence. Short term divergences like this have been going on for decades. I have no reason to believe this short term divergence is any different than any of the dozens of others.

There's no divergence long-term between GISS and HadCRUT w/ UAH poles. Over short periods like 8 years sometimes one warms faster than the other. This happens to be one of the periods where GISS warmed faster.

So it's just plain "luck" that GISS has managed to produce a record warm year three times since 2005, but no other source has? And this had never happened ONCE with any other source before. Interesting. I guess luck can explain a lot!

[skierinvermont]

I think its fair game to judge them since we started going to into the next cool phase. GISS has made retroactive adjustments to cool the previous warm phase in the 1930s/1940s. If GISS continues to run warm as we go deeper into this current cooling ocean cycle, then its certainly worthy of criticism.

As for your explanation over the ocean, the ocean anomaly should be slower to respond...and it doesn't explain for areas that only see a very brief loss of sea ice. Those anomalies should be fairly minimal.

But we'll see. We'll have our answer I think over the next 5 years IMHO. If GISS continues to diverge, then I think there is a legit issue with its methods.

Yes I think you're right about a place that never used to melt out and now melts out for just one month or something. The coastal station would be very anomalous and that large anomaly would get extrapolated over places that were still frozen.

I can't think of any station that is like that though. All of the arctic stations I know of melt out every year and have been doing so for a long time. They'll melt out earlier, which will bump up the anomalies. But this is compensated for by the fact that in later months when they are normally melted out, they'll be extrapolating small anomalies over water that used to be frozen but isn't anymore.

The problem occurs when you extrapolate a coastal station that melted out early over areas that are still frozen. But the opposite problem occurs when you extrapolate a coastal station that normally is melted out over water that is melted but is normally frozen. In that case you've probably got some really large anomalies near the ice edge (like +10) that are getting brushed over by a coastal station with smaller anomalies. It comes down to which one of these two phenomena predominates, since they have the opposite effect. I doubt it's a big deal, since it would only matter for a particular months at particular stations and the two phenomena would have a tendency to cancel. We also know that UAH and GISS have been similar enough in their long term arctic trends so as to not effect the global trend by much at all. Maybe that will change but I don't think so.

[skierinvermont]

So it's just plain "luck" that GISS has managed to produce a record warm year three times since 2005, but no other source has? And this had never happened ONCE with any other source before. Interesting. I guess luck can explain a lot!

HadCRUT + UAH infilling topped 1998 in 2005 and nearly tied it in 2002 and 2010.

I don't have much interest in grading GISS on the basis of HadCRUT or the satellites. The only alternate to GISS is HadCRUT + UAH infilling of the poles.

UAH and RSS are likely biased cold.

[nzucker]

So it's just plain "luck" that GISS has managed to produce a record warm year three times since 2005, but no other source has? And this had never happened ONCE with any other source before. Interesting. I guess luck can explain a lot!

Luck can explain a lot when Hansen is at the helm

[BethesdaWX]

HadCRUT + UAH infilling topped 1998 in 2005 and nearly tied it in 2002 and 2010.

I don't have much interest in grading GISS on the basis of HadCRUT or the satellites. The only alternate to GISS is HadCRUT + UAH infilling of the poles.

UAH and RSS are likely biased cold.

Now Fill in UAH data for the rest of the Global data-gaps...and you'll find out it doesn't

[tacoman25]

HadCRUT + UAH infilling topped 1998 in 2005 and nearly tied it in 2002 and 2010.

I don't have much interest in grading GISS on the basis of HadCRUT or the satellites. The only alternate to GISS is HadCRUT + UAH infilling of the poles.

UAH and RSS are likely biased cold.

This is irrelevant. Each dataset has its own strengths/weaknesses, coverage issues, and biases. None of that explains why one source is suddenly producing record warm years when the others aren't. If it were simply explained by the Arctic coverage, HadCRU should have been setting record warm years on its own in the 1980s, when the Arctic was really cold, and GISS shouldn't have.

And by the way, GISS didn't just top 1998 in 2010...it also topped 2005 and 2007, which it had warmer than 1998. So even if UAH/HadCRU had tied 1998 in 2010, it still would have fallen short of GISS in 2010.

[skierinvermont]

HadCRUT was diverging wildly from the others in the 1990s.

I assume you all would have been screaming bloody murder and accusing people of manipulation for HadCRUT's sudden warm spike during this period.

[BethesdaWX]

Who said anything about purposeful Manipulation? Its the methods we're questioning.

Now, fill in UAH for all the dataholes, not just the poles. What you are doing is Manipulation by filling in the poles, but not the rest of the Holes.

[skierinvermont]

No wonder GISS is diverging so cold with an AGW denier like Hansen at the helm...

Cooling nearly 3X faster than HadCRUT? WTF? Is he trying to pretend this is an ice age? Look at all those record highs HadCRUT is setting.

1988-1994

[BethesdaWX]

No wonder GISS is diverging so cold with an AGW denier like Hansen at the helm...

Cooling nearly 3X faster than HadCRUT? WTF? Is he trying to pretend this is an ice age? Look at all those record highs HadCRUT is setting.

1988-1994

Ok you're done

[tacoman25]

No wonder GISS is diverging so cold with an AGW denier like Hansen at the helm...

Cooling nearly 3X faster than HadCRUT? WTF? Is he trying to pretend this is an ice age? Look at all those record highs HadCRUT is setting.

1988-1994

Except HadCRU wasn't setting more record warm years in the 1980s and early 1990s than the other sources.

And choosing a period that includes Pinatubo is just a bit different than the past decade.

[ORH_wxman]

HadCRUT was diverging wildly from the others in the 1990s.

I assume you all would have been screaming bloody murder and accusing people of manipulation for HadCRUT's sudden warm spike during this period.

I've had my issues with CRU in the 1990s. They actually received a ton of criticism in the early 2000s over it. Lets not pretend they don't have a huge agenda in AGW either. It might be just coincidence, but they started coming in more tame around the time a lot of people were questioning their temps. If you read some old stuff from like 2000-2002 I'm sure you can find it.

[skierinvermont]

I've had my issues with CRU in the 1990s. They actually received a ton of criticism in the early 2000s over it. Lets not pretend they don't have a huge agenda in AGW either. It might be just coincidence, but they started coming in more tame around the time a lot of people were questioning their temps. If you read some old stuff from like 2000-2002 I'm sure you can find it.

How about we just accept that the error bars over short periods like this are pretty large and divergences are to be expected?

[ORH_wxman]

How about we just accept that the error bars over short periods like this are pretty large and divergences are to be expected?

That is a very reasonable explanation for now, but I don't think its strange to scrutinize GISS as he head deeper and deeper into the colder ocean cycles. We'll see if it keeps up. If it doesn't, then we can relax the noose around GISS a bit. But because they have been warm recently, they'll be scrutinized each time they come out with something off-kilter.

[skierinvermont]

That is a very reasonable explanation for now, but I don't think its strange to scrutinize GISS as he head deeper and deeper into the colder ocean cycles. We'll see if it keeps up. If it doesn't, then we can relax the noose around GISS a bit. But because they have been warm recently, they'll be scrutinized each time they come out with something off-kilter.

I pretty much agree but I think there's a difference between scrutinizing and assuming error or accusing manipulation. I think looking at the methodological reasons that one warms more than another during a period are interesting. If the divergence grew that would be a problem. Also as long as we're making some kind of correction for the blank arctic on HadCRUT.

[nzucker]

I pretty much agree but I think there's a difference between scrutinizing and assuming error or accusing manipulation. I think looking at the methodological reasons that one warms more than another during a period are interesting. If the divergence grew that would be a problem. Also as long as we're making some kind of correction for the blank arctic on HadCRUT.

None of the other methods have as obvious an error as GISS though, where you can just stare at the map for a second and be like, "what?" That's one reason it's more likely to be questioned, because the extrapolations are very apparent and obviously convert large areas into a monochrome image of warmth.

[tacoman25]

I pretty much agree but I think there's a difference between scrutinizing and assuming error or accusing manipulation. I think looking at the methodological reasons that one warms more than another during a period are interesting. If the divergence grew that would be a problem. Also as long as we're making some kind of correction for the blank arctic on HadCRUT.

And there is a difference between "assuming error or accusing manipulation" and having doubts about the integrity of an organization based on its leadership, and the inherent conflict of interest that exists with GISS.

[Clifford]

NOAA has released their March 2011 data showing a slight increase in temperatures from February 2011 to March 2011.

http://www.ncdc.noaa...c/global/2011/3

FEB 2011 / March 2011 Temperature Anomalies (Celsius)

Global Land 0.51/0.83

Global Ocean 0.36/0.36

Global L&O 0.40/0.49

NH Land 0.61/1.07

NH Ocean 0.31/0.28

NH L&O 0.42/0.58

SH Land 0.24/0.22

SH Ocean 0.41/0.44

SH L&O 0.38/0.40

However, they seem to be using the same graphs for both 2010 and 2011.

http://www.ncdc.noaa...c/global/2011/3

http://www.ncdc.noaa...c/global/2010/3

I sent an e-mail to the listed address at the bottom of the page. We'll see how long for them to respond.

2010 followed by new 2011 graphs. Note different headers, but the last line is the same in all cases (as of April 14).

Of course, if one ignores the years with decreasing temperatures, everything looks a lot warmer!!!!!!!!!!!!

Edit:

That was quick....

They got the graphs fixed this morning.

[BethesdaWX]

Dang, look atthe +AMO! Back to back years with incredibly warm AMO's during the spring.

Hurricane season could be fun (depending on how you view it).

We're not too far from record territory now, but we could break the +AMO record daily # late Month.

[Snow_Miser]

UAH and RSS are likely biased cold.

Sad that one would disregard the most accurate data that we have as being "biased cold..." maybe Skier... just maybe... it's the other way around...?

[BethesdaWX]

Sad that one would disregard the most accurate data that we have as being "biased cold..." maybe Skier... just maybe... it's the other way around...?

You are absolutely correct, skiers statement is a Bunch of Hilarious BS.

Skier has been very confused on the issue, I've tried to help him out, but he's ignored the actual data and decided to use refuted data. As in, posting a refuted study using RAOBCORE V1.2 instead of RAOBCORE v1.4....& the edit of infrared channel that wasn't done, but is now done to every Dataset.

His Zou Study is based off Old data that is no longer in use, and he won't admit it

[skierinvermont]

Sad that one would disregard the most accurate data that we have as being "biased cold..." maybe Skier... just maybe... it's the other way around...?

Perhaps you should familiarize yourself with the scientific literature on satellite temperature data, its interpretation, and its accuracy (or lack thereof).

Start here and then move onto the references cited:

http://www.skeptical...-Satellite.html

[LakeEffectKing]

Perhaps you should familiarize yourself with the scientific literature on satellite temperature data, its interpretation, and its accuracy (or lack thereof).

Start here and then move onto the references cited:

http://www.skeptical...-Satellite.html

This crap about "what method is more accurate" is....well, crap! It's the trends that matter, and if there is some long term divergence with one of them, when there was/is a reasonable consensus among the various reporting agencies/methods the skeptism should be raised re: the outlier. If 2 sats and 1 ground are trending together....and the outlier USED to trend with them, but NOW diverges, there had better be a REALLY OBVIOUS reason (without the need to ingest Kool-Aid) to toss the other 3.

I'm not saying GISS has shown a LONG term divergence at this point...but it's obviously been enough so at this point, to even be brought to the table......and that speaks nothing about taco's "elephant in the room" issue....