The Warming Of The World Oceans (0-700 Meters) In Degrees C

I’ve moved to WordPress.  This post can now be found at The Warming Of The World Oceans (0-700 Meters) In Degrees C

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THE GLOBAL OCEAN HEAT CONTENT ROSE APPROXIMATELY 16*10^22 JOULES FROM 1969 to 2008The units used to express Ocean Heat Content (OHC) are 10^22 Joules. Figure 1 from Levitus et al (2009) “Global Ocean Heat Content 1955–2008 In Light Of Recently Revealed Instrumentation Problems” follows. As illustrated, Ocean Heat Content of the upper 700 meters of the global oceans, using the linear trend as reference, rose approximately 16*10^22 Joules from 1969 to 2008, the period Levitus et al elected to use for linear trends. Link to Levitus et al (2009):
ftp://ftp.nodc.noaa.gov/pub/data.nodc/woa/PUBLICATIONS/grlheat08.pdf
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Levitus et al (2009) Figure 1

Unfortunately, most people cannot put that rise in Ocean Heat Content into perspective; that is, into familiar terms. Also, the number 16*10^22 Joules is simply too large to comprehend. An AGW proponent might write, “Since 1969, an additional 16*10^22 Joules of heat is being stored in the oceans.” The number is so large it sounds scary. Maybe that’s why it’s used.

BUT WHAT WAS THE TEMPERATURE RISE?
According to the supplemental material furnished with Levitus et al (2009), the temperature of the Global Oceans (0-700 meters) rose about 0.17 deg C from 1969 to 2008. Refer to Table T1 from Levitus et al (2009).
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Levitus et al (2009) Table T1

This equals a trend of approximately 0.042 Deg C/Decade or less than a half degree per century for the upper 700 meters.

ARE THERE ANY REFERENCES FOR GREATER DEPTHS?
The Abstract of an earlier Levitus et al paper, one from 2005, “The Warming Of The World Ocean: 1955 to 2003” states, “During 1955–1998 world ocean heat content (0–3000 m) increased 14.5 × 10^22 J corresponding to a mean temperature increase of 0.037°C at a rate of 0.20 Wm−2 (per unit area of Earth's total surface area).”
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2005/2004GL021592.shtml

0.037 Deg C from 1955 to 1998 equals a linear trend of less than 0.009 deg C/ Decade. The rise doesn’t sound catastrophic in those terms.

THE IMPACTS OF NATURAL VARIABLES
There has been a recent push to use Ocean Heat Content as a measure of anthropogenic global warming. Unfortunately for AGW proponents, there is little evidence that anthropogenic greenhouse gases have an effect on Ocean Heat Content.

As illustrated and discussed in the following posts, natural climate variations are the dominant causes of the rises in Global Ocean Heat Content. One simply needs to break the global OHC data down into logical subsets to witness these effects.
ENSO Dominates NODC Ocean Heat Content (0-700 Meters) Data
And:
North Atlantic Ocean Heat Content (0-700 Meters) Is Governed By Natural Variables
And:
North Pacific Ocean Heat Content Shift In The Late 1980s

Memo To Big Oil

I’ve moved to WordPress.  This post can now be found at Memo To Big Oil

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Dear Big Oil:

It has come to my attention that I am in your pocket. Refer to the following screen capture from the NewsBusters.org blog.
http://i45.tinypic.com/2lniu08.png
Proof Of Bob Tisdale Being In The Pocket Of Big Oil

Link to thread:
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/jeff-poor/2009/12/15/weak-keith-olbermann-jon-stewart-attack-inhofes-climate-skepticism

Note that being in the pocket of Big Oil implies that I am receiving payment from you for my “flat earther” blog posts. Unfortunately, I, as of this writing, have received no Big Oil moneys. I assume this is simply an oversight or a minor accounting error on your part, Big Oil.

Since you’ve sent my payments to another Bob Tisdale or have apparently missed my Paypal donations link, Big Oil, I’d like to point out that the said PayPal link is at the bottom of this webpage.

Any and all donations, Big Oil, would be greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,


Bob Tisdale

North Pacific Ocean Heat Content Shift In The Late 1980s

I’ve moved to WordPress.  This post can now be found at North Pacific Ocean Heat Content Shift In The Late 1980s

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The Ocean Heat Content (OHC) anomalies (0-700 meters) of the mid-to-high latitudes of the North Pacific Ocean shifted significantly in the late 1980s. The shift is visible in a graph of North Pacific OHC anomaly data from January 1955 to June 2009, Figure 1. The graph compares North Pacific OHC (24N-65N, 120E-110W) to arbitrarily scaled NINO3.4 SST anomalies and Sato Stratospheric Mean Optical Thickness data, with the latter datasets provided for the timing of ENSO events and explosive volcanic eruptions. Following an initial increase in the late 1950s, the North Pacific OHC data dropped for almost three decades, until the late 1980s. Then the North Pacific OHC anomalies rose significantly, with the majority occurring during the 1988/89 La Nina. Is the timing with the recharge and redistribution phase of that ENSO event a coincidence, or are the decadal changes in North Pacific OHC in synch with another variable?

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Figure 1

Figure 2 is a series of annual OHC anomaly maps from 1986 to 1991. It is clear that the shift in North Pacific OHC occurred east of Japan, in the western and central mid latitudes, an area known as the Kuroshio Extension.
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Figure 2

KUROSHIO EXTENSION OHC DATA
Figure 3 shows the region of the Northwest Pacific that I’ve used for Kuroshio Extension data in the remainder of the graphs. The coordinates are 30N-45N, 150E-160W.
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Figure 3

The OHC (0-700 meters) of the Kuroshio Extension is compared to that of the North Pacific in Figure 4. It is clear that the variability of the Kuroshio Extension OHC has a major impact on the OHC of the North Pacific.
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Figure 4

Figure 5 is a comparison graph of Kuroshio Extension OHC to arbitrarily scaled NINO3.4 SST anomalies and Sato Stratospheric Mean Optical Thickness data, again with the latter datasets provided for the timing of ENSO events and explosive volcanic eruptions. ENSO does not appear to be the primary driver of Kuroshio Extension OHC.
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Figure 5

THE NORTH PACIFIC INDEX EXHIBITS SIMILAR VARIATIONS

As defined by the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) Climate & Global Dynamics (CGD) webpage…
http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/jhurrell/npindex.html
…the North Pacific (NP) Index is “the area-weighted sea level pressure over the region 30N-65N, 160E-140W, available since 1899.” It also exhibits variations that are similar to those of the Kuroshio Extension OHC. Figure 6 shows the North Pacific Index data smoothed with a 37-month running-average filter.
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Figure 6

Comparing the scaled North Pacific Index data with the OHC for the Kuroshio Extension, Figure 7, illustrates the agreement between the two datasets.
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Figure 7

As discussed in my post North Atlantic Ocean Heat Content (0-700 Meters) Is Governed By Natural Variables, Lozier et al (2008) “The Spatial Pattern and Mechanisms of Heat-Content Change in the North Atlantic” identified the North Atlantic Oscillation as the driver of decadal North Atlantic OHC variability. Link to Lozier et al (2008):
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/319/5864/800?rss=1

Could the sea level pressure of the North Pacific also be the primary driver of decadal North Pacific OHC variability?

CLOSING COMMENT

If anthropogenic greenhouse gases had a noticeable impact on the OHC of the North Pacific, one would expect of a gradual rise in OHC. To the contrary, North Pacific OHC data declines from the late 1950s until the late 1980s. There was then a sharp rise from the late 1980s to the early 1990s, appearing to be strongly influenced by the North Pacific Index, followed by a decade-long decline until the early 2000s.

SOURCES
The NODC OHC data and the HADISST data used for NINO3.4 SST anomalies are available through the KNMI Climate Explorer:http://climexp.knmi.nl/selectfield_obs.cgi?someone@somewhere

Monthly North Pacific Index data from January 1899 to July 2009 is available through the UCAR CGD webpage:
http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/jhurrell/indices.data.html#npmon

Sato Index data is available through GISS:
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/modelforce/strataer/
Specifically:
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/modelforce/strataer/tau_line.txt