NASA: Globe In April Was 4th Warmest On Record

Even with a strong La Niña (see figure 2 below) and a slow exit from a deep solar minimum (see figure 3 below), the globally averaged temperature tied for the 4th warmest April on record, according to NASA’s GISS.  At 0.55°C above the 1951-1980 average, April 2011′s warmth trails only 2005, 2007, and 2010.  It tied with 2002 and just beat 1998.  It is worth noting that in 2010 and 1998, strong El Niños were occurring.  Such is the state of the climate having been forced by our species’ greenhouse gas pollution.  April’s 0.55°C anomaly follows March’s 0.57°C anomaly.

The location of warm and cool temperature anomalies across the globe has shifted somewhat from the patterns observed in 2010, as the first figure below shows.  While cooler than normal temperatures have occurred over the Canadian Arctic, the Eurasian Arctic remains much warmer than normal.  The broad stretch of below average temperatures across the central-eastern Pacific are the remnants of the waning La Niña.  Within 3-6 months, I expect to see more areas impacted by above average temperatures as the effects of La Niña go away.  And unless a major volcano event occurs within the next two years, I expect that 2012 will challenge 2010 for the warmest year on record.

Figure 1 – NASA GISS‘s plots of temperature anomaly for April 2011 (top-left), Feb.-Apr. 2011 (top-right), May 2010-Apr. 2011 (bottom-left) and the GISS 12-month running mean time series dating back to 1880.  The retreat from 2010′s record warmth can be seen by the latest 5 data points.

Figure 2 – Australia’s BOM time series of sea surface temperatures in the Nino3.4 region.  The anomalously cool temperatures from Jul 2010 through March 2011 are indicative of La Niña conditions.

Figure 3 – Physikalisch Meteorologisches Observatorium Davos, World Radiation Center‘s time series of solar irradiance through early 2011.  The extended “tail” to the right of the last solar peak in 2001 represents a deep, long-lived solar minimum.  Some of the Earth’s warmest annual global temperatures were recorded during this time period, which ends the silly argument that the sun alone is responsible for the warming observed on Earth.

NOAA Data Agrees With NASA Data: November Among Warmest Ever

NOAA released their November Global Analysis about a week ago.  That was a couple of weeks after NASA released their November analysis.  I’m not sure if this was due to data quality control issues, but the result is in line with NASA’s: November 2010 was very warm globally.  NOAA’s methodology differs from NASA’s, which makes comparison between the two a good exercise.

According to NOAA, November 2010 was the 2nd warmest in their dataset (131 years long), slightly behind November 2004.  NASA, in contrast, reported that November 2010 was the warmest in their dataset.  Neither is more correct than the other.  If a large discrepancy in analyzed temperatures appeared between the two, there would be cause for concern.  But both methodologies are producing quite similar results, especially over climatic time periods of multiple decades.

Some numbers:

NOAA recorded a +1.24°F (+0.69°C) temperature anomaly over land and ocean in November 2010.  They recorded a +1.30°F anomaly during November 2004.  2010′s global temperature anomaly “suffered” from La Nina, which cooled the tropical Pacific.  Largely as a result of this, global ocean temperatures were +0.70°F, which tied 1987 and 2008 for the 10th warmest in the NOAA record.  Land temperatures were an astounding +2.74°F warmer than usual.  That beat out 2004′s +2.41°F anomaly.

I want to draw attention to the Northern Hemispheric land temperature anomalies for November 2010.  The previous record was observed in 2001: +2.84°F.  November 2010 set a new record: +3.55°F!  That is neither beating the previous record by a slim margin nor is it indicative of the climate zombies’ favorite mantra, “global cooling”.  You don’t set hemispheric-wide temperature records for an entire month when the globe is cooling, not when the records only last a handful of years.

The global ocean temperatures are worth mentioning again.  Even with a moderate to strong La Nina in place in the previous handful of months affecting the Pacific Ocean, the 10th warmest ocean temperature anomalies on record were observed.  Put another way: the relatively strong signal of El Nino/La Nina is likely now being dominated by the growing signal of global warming.  Will fluctuations occur from year to year?  Of course they will.  Novembers between 2007 and 2010 are a good example.  A relatively wide range of global ocean temperature anomalies were recorded.  But each of them were larger than the similar measurements during the 1990s except for 1997 and 1998, when the strongest El Nino on record occurred.

NOAA also released seasonal and year-to-date numbers.  From September through November, global temperature anomalies were +1.04°F, the 6th warmest in their records.  From January through November, global temperature anomalies were +1.15°F, the warmest on record (beating out 2005′s +1.12°F).  Land temperatures are the warmest in the NOAA record and ocean temperatures are the 3rd warmest.  Doesn’t look like there’s much cooling, does it?

Lastly, I want to make mention of a topic I wrote about recently: for all the temperature records we’re already seeing being broken in recent years, we haven’t seen anything yet.  The vast majority of the heat accumulated by the globe so far as a result of global warming has been stored by the ocean, specifically the deep ocean.  The heat accumulated thus far therefore has not had a chance yet to affect atmospheric temperatures.  As the 21st century progresses, the heat will get that opportunity.  Warm deep water will upwell along continental coastlines, shifting local climates, until enough heat is released back into the atmosphere that the global climate shifts.  Unfortunately for the globe, past warming episodes have tended to occur quite quickly, on the order of tens of years.  That has been a shocking discovery made recently by climate scientists.  Warmer oceans and a warmer atmosphere will induce a higher frequency of severe weather events.  It won’t take much of an increase in the number of those events to cause real problems for governments around the world.  And until we get our greenhouse pollution under control, that’s the future we face: decades to centuries of a warmer climate and more extreme weather events.

Jan-Aug 2010 Hottest On Record: NASA & NOAA

You have likely heard or read by now that the first 8 months of global temperature in 2010 were the warmest of any such period in recorded history.  Unlike earlier months this year, I’ve started to see more coverage of this in the corporate media.  Unfortunately, the coverage I have seen has been short and lacking in critical context.  Most of the coverage has actually been of anecdotal situations, like the record-shattering 2010 Russian heat wave.  Stories about the above-average Atlantic hurricane season and the Pakistani floods leaving tens of millions displaced have typically not included much, if any, notation that record heat has been recorded across the globe.

NOAA recorded the 3rd warmest August on record; the 2nd warmest Jun-Aug on record; and Jan-Aug 2010 tied the same time period from 1998 as the warmest on record.  The most intense El Nino in recorded history occurred in 1997-1998, which helped push global temperatures to record levels.  The El Nino of 2009-2010 wasn’t nearly as strong, but added to the background warming brought about by global warming to match the warmest Jan-Aug in modern history.

August 2010

NASA’s global analysis reported a +0.67°C (+1.206°F) surface temperature anomaly for August 2010 (over the 1951-1980 base period).  August 2010 had the 7th highest anomaly of Augusts in the NASA dataset, according to NASA’s GISS dataset.

NOAA’s global analysis reported a +0.6°C (+1.08°F) surface temperature anomaly for August 2010.  According to the NOAA methodology, the two warmer Augusts observed were in 1998 (+1.3°F) and 2009 (+0.62°C  or +1.12°F).

The Heat Continues: NASA & NOAA Detail Warmest Jan-Jun On Record in 2010

The first half of 2010 has been the hottest globally in recorded history.  A small change from last month: I briefly saw this headline at the top of a corporate media outlet: MSNBC.  I should have taken a screen-shot because I saw it at 10:45P local time last night and it had been replaced by 11:00P when I looked again.  So it would be untruthful to claim, for this month at least, that you couldn’t have seen this story covered in a prominent way by the corporate media.  I will lament that it took four straight months of record warmth before they did, however.  I will also lament that it was replaced, nearly in the middle of night, by other headlines within minutes – short shrift for such an important topic.

In a similar fashion as last month, the NOAA analysis of global temperatures have marked the warmest month of June, the warmest 3-month April to June period and, along with NASA, the warmest 6-month January to June period in recorded human history.  That makes for one heck of a headline, doesn’t it?

June 2010

NASA’s global analysis reported a +0.59°C (+1.062°F) surface temperature anomaly for June 2010 (over the 1951-1980 base period).  June 2010 joined June 2005 as the third highest anomaly in the NASA dataset, behind the record anomaly from 1998 of 0.69°C (1.24°F) and the 0.62°C (1.116°F) anomaly from 2009, according to NASA’s GISS dataset.

NOAA’s global analysis reported a +0.68°C (+1.224°F) surface temperature anomaly for June 2010.  According to the NOAA methodology, the next warmest June was observed in 2005: +0.66°C (+1.188°F).

No Surprise: NASA & NOAA Detail Warmest May, Mar-May & Jan-May On Record in 2010; Future Hot Summers In The U.S. In Store

The first five months of 2010 have been the warmest in recorded history.  But have you seen that story covered by the corporate media?  Nope – and you aren’t likely to any time soon either … at least until the records become so widespread and intense that there’s no longer much we can do about them.

Both the NASA and NOAA analyses of global temperatures have marked the warmest month of May, the warmest 3-month March to May period and the warmest 5-month January to May period in recorded human history.  Both datasets go back 131 years into the past.  The warmest month, 3-month and 5-month periods out of 131 other years has been reached.  Perhaps if the highest scoring Super Bowl in history had just occurred, some corporate entity might be interested in covering it.

May 2010

NASA’s global analysis reported a +0.66°C (+1.134°F) surface temperature anomaly for May 2010 (over the 1951-1980 base period).  This tied the previous record anomaly from 1998 and beat the 0.59°C (1.062°F) anomaly from 2005, according to NASA’s GISS dataset.

NOAA’s global analysis reported a +0.69°C (+1.24°F) surface temperature anomaly for May 2010.  According to the NOAA methodology, the next warmest May was observed in 1998: +0.63°C (+1.13°F).

January-May 2010

With record and near-record monthly temperature averages observed so far in 2010, it is no surprise to see the January-May period this year also setting a temperature record.  According to NASA, the Jan-May 2010 period has been the warmest at +0.72°C (+1.3°F).  For comparison, NASA includes the same period from the two warmest years in their dataset so far: 2005 and 1998.  Globally averaged surface temperatures in Jan-May 2005 were +0.62°C (+1.118°F) and during the same period in 1998 were +0.61°C (+1.098°F).  So the Jan-May 2010 observed warmth was 0.10°C more than the same period in the warmest year to date on record.

According to NOAA, the Jan-May 2010 period has also been the warmest: +0.68°C (+1.224°F).  The NOAA site also contains information from the same period during the warmest or the next warmest year on record.  Their methodology differs slightly from NASA’s, but is just as valid and acts as an independent check on the other dataset.  NOAA’s methodology identified 1998 as the next warmest for global land and ocean surface temperatures at +0.67°C (+1.21°F).

Context

Global averages and multi-year trends are all very well and nice, but what do these records mean?  Is there a way to contextualize them in more day-to-day terms so that more of the public can understand the threat they pose?  I think so.  I’m going to provide a couple of examples that mean something to me; hopefully they help clarify the problem for others as well.

Record high temperatures have been occurring in the Middle East and Africa.  I know, big shock, you haven’t heard of those in the corporate media either.  Well, they happened.  I’m sure one of the stereotypical concepts of the Middle East and portions of Africa is the incredible heat the region experiences.  So what kind of records are we talking about?  Try 125.6°F (50°C) in Basra, Iraq on June 14; 125.6°F (50°C) in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia on June 22; 117.7°F (47.6°C) in Faya, Chad on June 22; 116.8°F (47.1°C) in Bilma, Niger.  Bahrain had its hottest day ever in June on the 20th – 46.9°C; Qatar similarly hit its hottest June day ever with 48.8°C.  Kuwait saw 123.8°F (51°C) on June 15th, missing their hottest all-time temperature by 1°F (0.9°C).  Myinmu, Myanmar hit its all-time record high back on May 12th – 116.6°F (47°C).

Okay, those are some really high temperatures.  Along the Front Range in Colorado, 100°F and higher have until now represented extremely hot days.  The frequency of 100°F days was, in the 20th century, pretty low – a couple of days at most during any one year, as the figure below from a recent NOAA report shows.

We have a choice to emit fewer emissions through the end of this century or more emissions. How many 100°F days could Colorado see if we take the low emissions path? 7-21 per year (1-3 weeks) for the Front Range and 35-49 per year (5-7 weeks) for southeast Colorado, as the next figure shows.  It is important to keep in mind that this emissions scenario depends on us changing our rate of pollution quickly and aggressively, something that does not look likely to happen.

Given our current, actual greenhouse gas emissions, which track along or slightly above the IPCC’s A1F1 scecario (the highest they considered), what kind of summers can we expect to see later this century?  8 weeks of 100°F days every year could become “normal”.  Not once or twice a year – up to 2 months of 100°F days.  Areas in southeast Colorado could be subjected to 12 weeks of 100°F days – the entire summer! – as the figure below shows.

In fact, nearly the entire country would, for the first time, experience 100°F days. The desert southwest? Given their current maximum yearly temperatures, I have to think they would find out what the Middle East goes through. Can you imagine what weeks of 100°F days would do to our agriculture, power sources and water supplies?  If we can imagine that hellish future, do we want to avoid it?  I hope that images like these and the implications of those realities coming to be will spur even more people to change their own personal lives as well as demand changes on the local, state, national and international scales.  Those temperature records I started out with could seem relatively balmy compared to the high emissions future we’re headed toward.

NASA & NOAA: April 2010 Hottest on Record; Jan-Apr 2010 Hottest on Record

Both NASA and NOAA released their separate analyses of global temperatures through April 2010 this week.  Both agencies come to the same conclusions: April 2010 was the warmest April on record; the four-month period of Jan-Apr 2010 was the warmest such period on record (dating back to 1880).

April 2010

NASA’s analysis reported a +0.73°C (+1.314°F) surface temperature anomaly for April 2010 (over the 1951-1980 base period).  This easily beat the previous record 0.66°C (1.188°F) anomaly from 2007 and the 0.62°C (1.116°F) anomaly from 2005, according to NASA’s GISS dataset.

NOAA’s analysis reported a +0.76°C (+1.37°F) surface temperature anomaly for April 2010.  According to the NOAA methodology, the next warmest April was observed in 1998: +0.71°C (+1.28°F).

January-April 2010

With record and near-record monthly temperature averages observed so far in 2010, it is no surprise to see the January-April period this year also setting a temperature record.  According to NASA, the Jan-Apr 2010 period has been the warmest at +0.75°C (+1.35°F).  For comparison, NASA includes the same period from the two warmest years in their dataset so far: 2005 and 1998.  Globally averaged surface temperatures in Jan-Apr 2005 were +0.64°C (+1.152°F) and during the same period in 1998 were +0.61°C (+1.098°F).  So the Jan-Apr 2010 observed warmth was 0.11°C more than the same period in the warmest year to date on record.  And yet the science-hating climate change deniers can’t stop themselves from talking about “global cooling”!  I will point out again that these temperature records are occurring at a time when the lowest and longest solar minimum in a century is just ending.  What will the next 5 to 10 years look like?

According to NOAA, the Jan-Apr 2010 period has also been the warmest: +0.69°C (+1.24°F).  The NOAA site also contains information from the same period during the warmest or the next warmest year on record.  Their methodology differs slightly from NASA’s, but is just as valid and acts as an independent check on the other dataset.  NOAA’s methodology identified 2002 as the next warmest for global land and ocean surface temperatures at +0.68°C (+1.22°F).  While the NOAA data don’t indicate the incredible surge in surface temperatures that the NASA data does, a record is a record.  Moreover, the long-term trend is really what counts.  And in both the NOAA and NASA datasets, the long-term trends are bad in terms of upcoming ramifications on ecosystems and human societies.

The NOAA report also includes information on tropospheric and stratospheric temperatures.  I want to point out that April 2010 has the 2nd warmest lower tropospheric (lowest 5mi/8km) of the atmosphere on record: +0.50°C (+0.90°F), behind 1998 which saw +0.76°C (+1.37°F) temperatures.  There is a big difference in this dataset from the ones I discuss above: the troposphere data goes back only 32 years.  Here is a visual representation of the dataset for Aprils from 1979-2010.  However, the data show the same kind of trend that the surface temperatures show: up.  1998 was likely affected more because of the intensity of the El Nino that was present over the 1997-1998 northern hemispheric winter season.  There has also been an El Nino event this winter, but has affected temperatures globally in slightly different ways.

I would like to mention something else at this point.  The Bush Regime tried very hard to delay or cancel satellite missions that would continue to monitor different conditions globally from being funded, and thereby launched.  Satellites don’t operate forever; replacements must be planned for and successfully launched and operated – all of which requires less interference from political hacks, like those that were put into publicly funded agencies by Bush.  I felt that interference was one of the under-reported stories in the last decade.  Without up-to-date technologies being planned and put into place to monitor conditions, some of the observations discussed in this post wouldn’t be possible.

2010 should set the annual average temperature record if the trends seen so far this year continue.  Natural processes and cycles are being overwhelmed by anthropogenic forcing (greenhouse gas pollution).  That’s why the proposed climate and energy legislation in both chambers of the U.S. Congress are so important.  That’s why the legislation must be strengthened, not weakened.  We continue along with business as usual at our own peril.

Cross posted at SquareState.

NASA: 2009 Had 2nd Warmest Surface Temps On Record; 2000s Warmest Decade On Record

NASA released some data a few days ago confirming what many objective observers were saying about 2009: it would be one of the hottest years for planet Earth in modern recorded history.  The NASA data mesh well with what NOAA and UKMet had already announced.  Importantly, the NASA data include temperatures over very northern latitudes, while UKMet chooses instead to interpolate surface station temperatures on coastlines over the Arctic Ocean, where direct measurements are scarce.  Unsurprisingly, the NASA data have been shown to be more representative of conditions where observations are made away from land.  As a result of slightly different methodologies of constructing the temperature data, the three datasets have, at times, slightly different messages to deliver.  2009 was such a case in which all three largely agree with one another: global temperatures continue to increase in the long-term (day-to-day weather conditions aren’t representative of climate).

According to NASA, 2009′s globally average surface temperatures ranked 2nd behind 2005′s (and tied with 2007′s): 0.57°C above average, compared to 0.63°C above average:

NASA & NOAA: Global September Temperatures Nearly Broke All-Time Record

In the past week or so, NASA released data and NOAA released a report confirming climate activists’ fears: 2009 is going to challenge global temperature records.  There are a number of reasons this is especially troubling to me, which I’ll get to below.

First, the news is this.  Two independent scientific agencies confirm that September 2009 had the 2nd highest surface temperatures on record.  Dating back to 1880, the only warmer September occurred in 2005.  From NOAA: the combined global land and ocean surface temperature was 1.12 degrees F above the 20th century average of 59.0 degrees F.  NASA’s measurement, probably the best in the world, indicated a 1.17F anomaly, very much in line with NOAA’s calculation.

Unprincipled Whiners

No matter what the issue, Cons have demonstrated that their only party platform is whatever anti-Obama happens to be.  In a growing number of cases, this holds true … until the Cons end up working for the opposite of what they initially “stood for”.  Confused yet?  Don’t be – let’s look at the latest example.  The Cons were entirely against the stimulus funding late last year and early this year.  They issued their typical free-market-religious talking points that made no sense and patted themselves on the back for opposing anything that President Obama wanted done.

Now, a different story emerges.  The same Cons who voted against the stimulus are now begging for some of those stimulus dollars to be doled out to NASA instead of other places.  Now, don’t get me wrong.  They certainly haven’t had an epiphany about the role that science should play in our society.  No, we’re still a looooong way from that.  Like everything else, this beg-session is all about politics.  In this case, they can bring home some federal money (since they refuse to pay for things themselves, socialists that they are) and pat each other on the back about that.

The best part?  They continue to slam the stimulus funding while begging for it to be redirected toward NASA.  Two opposing viewpoints in the same request!  How uniquely conservative of them.

It would make more sense for these clowns to request an increase in NASA’s operating budget for FY10 or FY11, if they’re really so concerned about the space program.  But that won’t happen.  They’re anti-public-investment, anti-health care reform, pro-rich tax cuts and pro-occupation.  You see, Trillions of future taxpayer dollars can be spent occupying Iraq and Afghanistan.  Billions and billions of taxpayer dollars can be redistributed from the middle class to the rich.  But health care reform and stimulus?  Not a chance!  Unless they can get something out of it politically.  That’s immoral.

Quick Hit: Discovery Launch Postponed

This is slightly older news, but the shuttle Discovery’s launch that was set for Wednesday has been posponed due to a hydrogen gas leak.  The new launch date has been set for Monday the 16th.  Discovery is slated to deliver the last truss segment and the last set of solar panels to the International Space Station.  A replacement part to the urination recycling unit delivered in November is also supposed to go up.  The solar panels and urination system will allow the ISS crew to grow from 3 to 6 persons.