Met Office Prediction: “Climate could warm to record levels in 2010”

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But They Fail To Tell You Why

The Met Office begins their December 10, 2009 press release…
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2009/pr20091210b.html
…with, “A combination of man-made global warming and a moderate warming of the tropical Pacific Ocean, a phenomenon known as El Niño, means it is very likely that 2010 will be a warmer year globally than 2009.” They continue, “The latest forecast from our climate scientists, shows the global temperature is forecast to be almost 0.6 °C above the 1961–90 long-term average. This means that it is more likely than not that 2010 will be the warmest year in the instrumental record, beating the previous record year which was 1998.”

Most people would assume the “man-made global warming” portion of the opening sentence refers to anthropogenic greenhouse gases. But in this instance I believe “man-made” means the bias in the instrument temperature record, the Hadley Centre’s HADCRUT3GL data, the Hadley Centre created when they spliced two SST datasets together in 1998.

A year ago today, in the post The Step Change in HADSST Data After the 1997/98 El Nino, I plotted the differences between HADSST2 SST anomaly data and the SST anomalies of the three NOAA/NCDC SST datasets: ERSST.v2, ERSST.v3b, and OI.v2 datasets. Refer to Figures 1 through 3 for updated graphs.
http://i49.tinypic.com/j090g1.png
Figure 1
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http://i49.tinypic.com/20qgmk5.png
Figure 2
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http://i47.tinypic.com/2gx2nwm.png
Figure 3

The HADSST2 data acquired this man-made shift in Global SST data when they changed source SST datasets from ICOADS to NCEP-GTS in 1998. A coincidence? The supplier writes:

“ICOADS Data
“The total period of record is currently 1784-May 2007 (Release 2.4), such that the observations and products are drawn from two separate archives (Project Status). ICOADS is supplemented by NCEP Real-time data (1991-date; limited products, NOT FULLY CONSISTENT WITH ICOADS).” [Emphasis added.]

Refer to:
http://icoads.noaa.gov/products.htmland:
http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadsst2/

Recently I also compared the global SST anomalies of HADSST2 and the other Hadley Centre’s SST dataset, HADISST, again plotting the difference between the two. Refer to Figure 4.
http://i45.tinypic.com/f3e5vo.png
Figure 4

If the Global HADCRUT data is in record territory in 2010, it is in large part the product of poor source dataset splicing of the HADSST2 portion of the HADCRUT data. The period bias in their SST data varies from 0.06 to 0.12 deg C, depending on the dataset one uses for comparison.

The other portion of the record is the product of the multiyear aftereffects of the 1997/98 El Nino that I’ve discussed in numerous posts. The most recent overview of this is included in Global Temperatures This Decade Will Be The Warmest On Record….

SOURCE

ERSST.v2, ERSST.v3b, OI.v2, HADISST, and HADSST2 data is available through the LNMI Climate Explorer:
http://climexp.knmi.nl/selectfield_obs.cgi?someone@somewhere################

WMO Press Announcement Is Missing A Few Things

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The World Meteorological Organization Press Release Number 869 “2000-2009, The Warmest Decade” is missing a few things. Link:
http://www.wmo.int/pages/mediacentre/press_releases/pr_869_en.html

The text of the press release DOES NOT CONTAIN the words:

Anthropogenic, or

Greenhouse, or

Manmade, or

“Climate Change”.

My post “Global Temperatures This Decade Will Be The Warmest On Record…” discussed the reasons for the record decadal temperatures. I posted it approximately one month ago, in advance of the misinformation sure to be spread by the press and alarmist blogs.

More Detail On The Multiyear Aftereffects Of ENSO - Part 3 – East Indian & West Pacific Oceans Can Warm In Response To Both El Nino & La Nina Events

I’ve moved to WordPress.  This post can now be found at More Detail On The Multiyear Aftereffects Of ENSO – Part 3 – East Indian & West Pacific Oceans Can Warm In Response To Both El Nino & La Nina Events

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INTRODUCTION

This is Part 3 of a multipart post. It addresses critical comments about my earlier posts that dealt with the multiyear aftereffects of major traditional El Nino events. Two specific major traditional El Nino events, those in 1986/87/88 and 1997/98, caused Sea Surface Temperatures (SST) of the East Indian and West Pacific Oceans to remain at elevated levels during the subsequent La Nina events. These SST residuals, what I have called step changes in earlier posts for the sake of simplicity, bias global SST upward during the La Nina events and give the impression of a gradual increase, one that is erroneously attributed to anthropogenic greenhouse gases.

Links to Parts 1 and 2:
More Detail On The Multiyear Aftereffects Of ENSO – Part 1 – El Nino Events Warm The Oceans

More Detail On The Multiyear Aftereffects Of ENSO - Part 2 – La Nina Events Recharge The Heat Released By El Nino Events AND...During Major Traditional ENSO Events, Warm Water Is Redistributed Via Ocean Currents.

Part 3 is a relatively short post in comparison to the first two in this series. It illustrates very simply that East Indian and West Pacific SST anomalies can rise during both phases of major traditional ENSO events. That is, it shows that the East Indian and West Pacific Oceans can warm in response to both an El Nino event and to the La Nina that follows it.

THE DIPOLE EFFECT

In Part 2 (More Detail On The Multiyear Aftereffects Of ENSO - Part 2 – La Nina Events Recharge The Heat Released By El Nino Events AND...) I discussed the processes that cause the East-West dipole effect between East Pacific SST anomalies and the SST anomalies of the East Indian and West Pacific Oceans. A .gif animation, Figure 1, shows the SST anomalies for the SST anomalies for November 1997 (the peak of the 1997/98 El Nino) and for November 1998 (the peak of the 1998/99 La Nina) and shows the resulting El Nino-La Nina seesaw relationship of SST anomalies between those two regions.
http://i48.tinypic.com/xc6s0l.gif
Figure 1

EAST INDIAN AND WEST PACIFIC SST ANOMALIES WARM FIRST IN RESPONSE TO THE EL NINO

Part 1 (More Detail On The Multiyear Aftereffects Of ENSO – Part 1 – El Nino Events Warm The Oceans) discussed how the changes in atmospheric circulation in response to the El Nino travel from west to east, with the Atlantic Ocean SST anomalies peaking 4 to 5 months after the El Nino and the Indian Ocean SST anomalies lagging by 5 to 7 months. These changes in atmospheric circulation continue east and raise SST anomalies of the East Indian and West Pacific Oceans. Refer to the 1986/87/88 and the 1997/98 El Nino events in Figure 2.
http://i46.tinypic.com/epks8.png
Figure 2

INVERTING NINO3.4 SST ANOMALIES ILLUSTRATES THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN LA NINA EVENTS AND EAST INDIAN AND WEST PACIFIC SST ANOMALIES

After the changes in atmospheric circulation begin to raise the SST anomalies of the East Indian and West Pacific Oceans, the warm water that was released from below the surface of the Pacific Warm Pool returns to the surface of the East Indian and West Pacific Ocean, raising the SST anomalies there to higher levels. The SST anomalies of the East Indian and West Pacific Oceans are then maintained by the La Nina. To illustrate this relationship, I’ve inverted NINO 3.4 SST anomalies and shifted them upwards by 0.2 deg C. Refer to Figure 3.
http://i48.tinypic.com/28bhgjk.png
Figure 3

CLOSING

Since both the El Nino and La Nina portions of major traditional El Nino events warm the SST anomalies of the East Indian and West Pacific Oceans, their SST anomalies appear to rise in steps. Ocean currents then blend these natural increases in SST anomalies for the East Indian and West Pacific Oceans with the other oceans, raising the SST anomalies globally. The resulting increases in global SST anomalies are mistakenly attributed to anthropogenic greenhouse gases.

SOURCE
SST Anomaly data and maps are available from the NOAA NOMADS webpage:
http://nomad3.ncep.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/pdisp_sst.sh?lite=