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.

Record Atmospheric CO2 Concentration April 2010: 392.39ppm

Just like last month, a record was set in April 2010.  Just like last month, the corporate media was absolutely silent about it.  Cons like to whine about how liberal the media is.  Don’t you think if the media had a liberal slant, they wouldn’t hesitate to trumpet rising CO2 concentrations?

Atmospheric CO2 concentrations measured at Mauna Loa, Hawai’i were the highest for a single calendar month in our history: 392.39ppm.

Monthly data for the past four years and the entire 52-year dataset can be found at NOAA’s ESRL Trends website.

The change from April 2009 to April 2010 was 2.93ppm, one of the largest jumps for the same month from one year to the next in the observations.

It should come as no surprise that record CO2 concentrations year after year have helped lead to the warmest March on record (March 2010), the 2nd warmest year on record (2009) and the warmest decade on record (the 2000s).  This year should be another one of the warmest, if not the warmest, on record due to various states of climatological cycles (El Nino, NAO, etc).

Keep in mind, however, that we’re also currently just coming out of the longest solar minimum in the past century.  Climate change deniers like to say that the solar cycle still controls most of the year-to-year variation seen in our climate.  If the 2nd warmest year on record occurred during a solar minimum, what do they think will happen in the next 5 years?  Those record CO2 concentrations are starting to take over as a leading factor in the climate.  That won’t change until the concentrations are forced back under 350ppm.

NASA & NOAA: March 2010 Warmest on Record

Earlier this week, I posted a piece about the warmest March on record, according to NASA’s satellite dataset.

Yesterday, NOAA issued their March 2010 Global Analysis.  Their analysis is constructed in a different way than is NASA’s, which is good – it serves as an independent check on the other.    NOAA reached the same conclusion as NASA did: March 2010 was the warmest March on record.

According to NOAA, globally averaged temperatures for the month of March reached 1.39°F (0.77°C) above the 20th century average of 54.9°F (13.5°C).

Here are what the worldwide temperature anomalies look like.  You can see the very warm (compared to normal) temperatures across Canada, the Middle East, Africa and South America.  Cooler temperatures were found across eastern Russia, southeast US and northeastern Europe.

One relatively short-lived pattern is helping to drive these record temperature anomalies: El Niño.  One of the warmest Marches on record was observed during the 1997-1998 El Niño event.  That El Niño was much stronger than this one in intensity – so something else must be impacting the temperatures.  That something is very likely human-induced climate change.  The solar cycle remains near its minima – that hasn’t changed in well over a year now.

It is crucial to understand that the vast majority of the warming the Earth has experienced as a result of human-induced climate change has occurred not on land, but in the oceans.  The Earth’s temperature above land in recent months and years has increased above climatological averages, that is true.  But the oceans have absorbed more heat than the land has.  And that will have significant repercussions in the future.  That heat has to go somewhere because the climate system is out of balance and it’s getting worse by the year.  That heat, due to the lag in response time of the ocean, will be around for decades to centuries.  The more we add, the longer it will take to return to the climate of the past 1000 years.

As I wrote earlier this week, people should expect additional records to be set this year and in the long-term.  Until we stop forcing the climate, and for a long while after that, things will just keep getting warmer.

Cross-posted at SquareState.

NASA: March 2010 Warmest On Record

According to NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), March 2010 witnessed the warmest globally averaged temperatures for any March in the past 131 years: 0.84°C above normal.

Globally, temperatures from January-March were 0.75°C above normal, ranking 2nd in the GISS record and beating out the same time periods from 2005 and 1998, the two warmest years in the GISS record.

This comes on the heels of the 6th warmest February, according to NOAA, which calculates global temperatures slightly differently than does NASA.  NOAA should release their own monthly report in the next couple of days.

The location of places that were warmer and cooler than normal continued from the past few months: below average in the southeast U.S., Europe and most of Russia.  Mexico was also cooler than normal.  Meanwhile, Canada and the Arctic experienced much warmer temperatures than normal.  The Middle East, northern Africa, South America and Antarctica were also notably warm.

Given our continued climate forcing with greenhouse gas pollution, the 2010s are likely to set a new record for the warmest decade.  This was true for the 2000s, the 1990s and the 1980s.  2010 is already starting out with some of the warmest temperatures globally on record.  Shifting some of those warmer than normal temperatures over the U.S. might help to convince the public that the developing climate crisis deserves their attention.

February 2010: 6th Warmest on Record

NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) has released their February 2010 Global Analysis Report.  Preliminary analysis indicates that globally averaged surface temperatures in February 2010 were the 6th warmest on record (dating back to 1880): 1.08°F (0.60°C) above the 20^th century average of  53.9°F (12.1°C).  Perhaps more significantly, lower tropospheric temperatures were the 2nd warmest on record (dating back to 1979), trailing only February 1998, when a very strong El Nino was impacting the planet.

As I wrote one month ago, this 6th warmest February follows the 4th warmest January and the 8th warmest December.  This makes the Dec-Jan-Feb average surface temperature the fifth warmest on record for the season,  1.03°F(0.57°C) above the 20^th century average of  53.8°F(12.1°C).

Conditions around the globe were pretty similar to those reported in January: below average temperatures over the U.S., Europe and Russia.  Much warmer temperatures than normal over Alaska, Canada, northern Africa and the Middle East.  The heat anomalies resulting from the current moderate El Nino can be seen in the Pacific Ocean as well.

Why did most of the U.S. experience below average temperatures while Alaska and Canada were so warm?  The Arctic Oscillation continued to make its presence felt.  This winter, the AO allowed cooler air from the Arctic to flow south over southern land masses while allowing warmer air from the mid-latitudes to flow north.  But remember, everything is relative.  Those warmer temperatures over the Arctic still weren’t high enough to melt sea ice, for example.  The cooler temperatures flowing out from the Arctic actually allowed for new ice to form along the edge of ice that already existed, bucking trends seen in recent years.  The Arctic witnessed a late-season surge of ice growth that I’ll cover in more detail in a few more weeks.

One of the unfortunate side-effects of a cooler than normal winter across the U.S. is the public’s perception of climate change and its effects.  Too often, folks confuse weather and climate.  I think that’s fairly natural: weather is what we experience every day; climate is about long-term trends and our memories are often different than what recorded observations indicate. Blizzards up and down the populous east coast don’t exactly spur thoughts of a warmer globe.

Legislation that would begin addressing climate change on a national scale continues to be bottled up in the dysfunctional U.S. Senate.  Closer to home, efforts like increasing Colorado’s Renewable Energy Standard to 30% by 2020 are pushing local efforts further.  We need to focus on what the climate trends are and act accordingly.  We can (must!) upgrade and update the way we live with a great deal of real cost savings in the next 10 years.  There are more “6th warmests” ahead of us, even if we do make the needed changes.  How many there are is largely up to us.

Cross-posted at SquareState.

January 2010: 4th Warmest on Record

NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) has released their January 2010 Global Analysis Report.  Perhaps the biggest piece of news is that globally averaged temperatures in 2010 were the 4th warmest on record.

This very warm January follows the 8th warmest December, the 4th warmest November and the 5th warmest year on record.

A look at conditions around the globe tells us that Canada, Greenland, northern Siberia (all areas that have already experienced the most warming globally), Africa, the Middle East and southeast Asia were all up to 9F warmer than usual.  Places in Europe and western Russia experienced 9F cooler than usual conditions.  The areal extent of the warm anomalies greatly exceeds that of the cool anomalies, resulting in the globally warmer conditions.

This warming occurred during a moderate El Nino event and the longest solar minimum in the past century.

What’s at stake?  If we continue to do next to nothing to address climate change, 8.6F warmer average temperatures; not anomalies, average.  The current set of proposals by countries to do something might reduce that warming to 7F.  The target established by actual scientists is 2.7F.  We have a long way to go.  You can expect to hear about new warmest months and years on record for years to come.

Cross-posted at SquareState.

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.