RSS, UAH (v5.2) and the new revised UAH (v5.3) February temperature anomalies for the lower troposphere have been posted; anomalies during the observational record are shown below along with the multi-model mean for the surface temperature based on 20th century simulations extended into the 21st century using A1B :
Comparison of the RSS and UAH observations indicates the observed least squares trend applied to observations during the observational record continues to lag the least squares trend based on the multi-model mean anomaly for the surface. Of course, it would be more appropriate to compare to projections for the lower troposphere, but for monthly blog posts I’m using trends from simulations that are available at “The Climate Explorer”. The most recent individual monthly observations are warmer than the value corresponding to the multi-model mean temperature anomaly. We must all wait to see whether the current El Nino will provide a sufficient number or warm months to close the gap in the trend.
The current reported anomalies are compared to those from last month and February 1998 below:
| Year | month | RSS | UAH 5.3 | UAH 5.2 |
| Reported temperature anomaly in C | ||||
| 2010 | 1 | 0.640 | 0.630 | 0.724 |
| 2010 | 2 | 0.588 | 0.613 | 0.740 |
| 1998 | 2 | 0.736 | 0.753 | 0.753 |
February 2010 exhibited a warm lower troposphere, but records for observed February values set in 1998 remains unbroken. Now, we await GISS and Hadley to see what they show for February!
Wow, that’s a huge difference between v5.2 and v5.3. Am I missing something? Why did they go to a new version, and why is the difference so large?
Doug–
The changes from 5.2 to 5.3 are discussed here: http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/03/february-2010-uah-global-temperature-update-version-5-3-unveiled/
There is little effect on the long term trend. The problem was related to instrument mis-match that resulted in an annual cycle being present in the UAH data.
Lucia,
Shouldn’t there be a difference in UAH 5.2 and 5.3 Feb 1998 temps?
Also, it will take more than an ENSO year to change the ’78-present trend much. It may make the 2001-present trend consistent though; we will see.
This may be a little OT. Given that warm air rises, would not the satallite measurements be contaminated with UHI?
Douggerell,
A short history of the genesis of UAH 5.3, with a comparison to 5.2 is here.
http://deepclimate.org/2010/03/08/a-first-look-at-uah-5-3/
UAH 5.2 had a severe spurious annual cycle in recent years.
Given that warm air rises, would not the satallite measurements be contaminated with UHI?
.
short answer: no.
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the effect is pretty small, even on the record of thermometers directly affected by it.
.
UHI is not a significant force, heating the atmosphere or the oceans.
Roy–
The main problem with UHI is not its mere existence, or even that it mostly affects the ground but the fact that thermometer tended to be disproportionately deployed in urban rather than rural settings. So, even though the area occupied by major cities was large, the temperature might be biased high in those cities.
It’s not entirely clear this would automatically result in a huge bias in the trend. But the UHI effect is sufficiently noticeable for reasonable people to suspect it would. That’s why people are always trying to estimate the magnitude of the effect.
In contrast, the satellite doesn’t measure preferentially in cities vs. country. So, UHI doesn’t affect it so much even if it occurs. It also looks like Roy is going to try to tease out the effect using the satellite data. That’s a pretty cool idea.
As for the “heat rises” issue– as air rises, it also mixes. The wind blows. Lots of things happen. So, UHI existing on the ground will be less detectable the further up you go. You don’t expect to see it as much in measurements of the lower troposphere. To tease out the effect, Roy is measuring the ground temperature.
Lucia:
Taking the slope of UAH 5.3 as an example – is that .013 for one year?
If the trend continued for 100 years does this imply a temperature increase over that 100 year period of 1.3 degrees C?
If so, is this not significantly below the projected temperature increase of 2.5 – 6 degrees C by 2100?
The reason that UHI would not bias satellites is because the heat from cities dissipates through the large volume of air that is the atmosphere. As the hot air rises, it cools down because the air around it is cooler and there is a lot more of it.
Like saying, there are volcanoes in the ocean so measuring the SST is biased because the volcanic heat will rise. Nah, it dissipates through the vast volume of water.
RickA (Comment#37415)-Certainly, although that leads to the question of whether it would really stay at the current rate or accelerate.
If you believe the IPCC’s forecasts, then it has to. Of course, if you doubt them, then it doesn’t.
If the long term trend does not increase, but remains near the level since 1979, it is significantly below an increase of 2.5 – 6 C by 2100. Yes.
The reason that UHI would not bias satellites is because the heat from cities dissipates through the large volume of air that is the atmosphere. As the hot air rises, it cools down because the air around it is cooler and there is a lot more of it.
Like saying, there are volcanoes in the ocean so measuring the SST is biased because the volcanic heat will rise. Nah, it dissipates through the vast volume of water.
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either i completely misunderstood you, or what you wrote was absolute and complete bogus.
sod–
Why do you think what Andrew_FL said is bogus? (Off to the gym now.)
RickA,
To nuance Lucia’s answer a bit, even on the emission trajectories and sensitivities that would lead to 6 C warming by 2100, you wouldn’t expect a rate of warming of 0.6 C per decade for the current decade, so its not a particularly informative comparison. Its the Monckton mistake, if you will 🙂
I would bet everything I have that sod misunderstood me.
Andrew_FL:
Actually, Sod seems to think that urban environments don’t get appreciably warmer than the surrounding country side.
But the urban environment is a real heat source (especially the industrial areas) and there are important differences in land coverage (e.g., asphalt parking lots) and air circulation patterns (sky scrapers), and the added pollutants play a role in trapping more heat. A 5-6°C rise in ambient temperature in urban settings compared to the surrounding country side is not unheard of.
If the satellites were measuring in the ABL they’d measure the same temperature. It’s only because they are integrating over a much larger vertical column of air that is above the ABL, which is being advected across the city, that you don’t see huge effects.
It ties back to why satellites don’t measure the same quantity as surface air temperature.
But that said… if they were measuring the temperature in the ABL, it would be a real increase in temperature, not a “bias”.
The bias in the land-based instrumentation record occurs when you have a sparse set of sensors and you oversample the urban regions relative to the rural ones, or when your instrument is badly sited (e.g., by a pavement or an AC unit).
Satellites cover the entire globe (less the polar regions) and there are no siting issues, so there is no bias introduced. Whatever additional warming they measure from cities is real.
I think sod probably meant the latter; any UHI measured by satellites is real global warming so to speak, since satellites give no preferential treatment to cities.
Andrew_FL (Comment#37426) March 10th, 2010 at 3:27 pm
I’ll take a rough shot at what made sod angry.
“As the hot air rises, it cools down because the air around it is cooler and there is a lot more of it.”
This is implying a simple dilution effect. But hot air rising will cool down, even without heat transfer or mixing. It’s doing PV work as it expands against the surrounding lower pressure air. The ‘adiabatic’ in adiabatic lapse rate.
I’d like to think so Zeke, but “UHI is not a significant force, heating the atmosphere or the oceans” seems pretty definitive.
I think he’s conflating UHI bias with UHI effect.
While I’m on the thermo trip:
Let’s actually consider UHI in terms of the planet’s energy balance. Forget that it’s tiny compared to everything else; let’s diagnose what it really is, in the big picture.
For this, we need to talk about where UHI is really coming from. I think waste heat is actually rather minor to UHI, but I haven’t an analysis to point to. I think it’s safe to call waste heat an input to the energy balance.
We’ve also got changes in albedo. That’s actually changing the planet’s radiation balance, so that counts.
Then we’ve got changes in heat capacity of the materials, we’ve got reduced evaporative cooling at the surface, we’ve got reduced convection, we’ve got reduced views to the sky for radiative cooling. These are the parts to maybe think through. Do any of these things actually change the planet’s energy balance, at TOA (even in tiny ways)? Grrf.
Zeke Hausfather (Comment#37422)
I think I understand.
It doesn’t have to be .6 degrees each decade – it may jump around – but over the 10 decades it would add up to 6 degrees C (assuming the high end of the range).
Still the trend over 3 decades is averaging .013 * 10 or .13 degrees C per decade, which seems pretty low compared to what it will have to do to get near the top of the IPCC range (.6 degrees per decade).
It just struck me that the IPCC is really expecting something different than the past trend from 1979 to 2009 for the next 90 years (on average). It would have to double to even hit the low range of the 2 degree C end of the IPCC range.
Based on Roy Spencer’s new article the “UHI” effect can be +0.8 C for population densities of 100/km2, +0.7 C for 25 people/km2 and even +0.5 C at only 10/km2.
I have this as “UHI” since the ‘urban’ and ‘island’ bits are starting to look to be an oversimplification. Maybe it should be Human Heat Effect.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/03/global-urban-heat-island-effect-study-an-update/
If you were to look at an average population density of 25 per km2 you could see substantial proportions of the continents affected. Thus at least some “UHI” signal in UAH/RSS would seem plausible. The obvious exception is Antarctica, which hasn’t been warming based on the UAH 25 year trend (see http://climate.uah.edu/25yearbig.jpg ).
Add in warming from land use changes recently highlighted on Pielke Snr’s site and the HHE seems even more pervasive.
http://tinyurl.com/y8jvo37
Zeke – I’ve been reading your analyses with interest. I’m surprised how little UHI effect you are seeing, although I suspect one of the problems with the GHCN set is the subjective classifications, as you point out. It could take a lot of auditing to tease out both of the above effects. Having said this data is data, apparent contradictions only mean that I don’t understand what it is saying.
Carrot Eater, the albedo effect by itself is pretty large. Go from an albedo of 0.3 or so to 0.05 or so for 5-10% of the surface of the Earth, concentrated between ±60° of the equator.
I get something like 0.3 W/m^2 averaged over the surface of the Earth. (Check my math!)
That’s pretty big if it’s correct.
The US uses around 1e20 Joules of energy per year, that works out to about 3 trillion watts, divide by area of continental US (7.6 million km2)… I get around 0.4 W/m2 (keep in mind this is only over 4% of the Earth’s surface). Obviously you need to include these numbers in regional scale climate simulations.
Total radiative forcings from CO2 is around 1.5 W/m2 for comparison.
Bruce,
Roy is looking at the effect of UHI on the absolute temps; I’m looking at its effects on the trend. They are somewhat of a different beast, as the trend impact will be much smaller than the absolute temp difference unless 100% of the area went from rural to urban with no change in the stations reporting.
Metadata is problematic, which is one of the reasons why nightlights and pop density data is useful as an independent check, though there are still some difficulties introduced by imprecise geolocation of stations.
Re: RickA (Mar 10 16:40),
Yes. 2-6 C warming during the 21st century represents more warming than we would get if we merely extrapolated based on the recent warming. Also, the rate of warming should be both noisy and the “underlying trend” is anticipated to be non-linear.
Re: Zeke Hausfather (Mar 10 16:59),
I bet ‘cha Roy is planning to look at the effect on trends.
You know one interesting thing about Roy’s graph of UHI with population density? It suggests that if we take the population we have now and spread all the people around evenly, that would cause a warming trend. I think…. I might have to do that as a “toy” problem!
lucia (Comment#37446)-“It suggests that if we take the population we have now and spread all the people around evenly, that would cause a warming trend.”
Actually population density is almost certainly acting as a proxy for something different.
carrot eater (Comment#37436)-Something tells me that sod didn’t have that in mind (it’s a highly technical point that I am glad you pointed out, but sod seems to be saying what I said was just wrong, completely, and not close to the truth).
lucia (Comment#37446) March 10th, 2010 at 5:32 pm
“Re: Zeke Hausfather (Mar 10 16:59),
Roy is looking at the effect of UHI on the absolute temps; I’m looking at its effects on the trend. They are somewhat of a different beast,”
This is the gridded dataset Roy is using
http://sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu/gpw/
Is this the dataset Ron used for his density data?
I went there and used theirtool
‘http://sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu/gpw/wps.jsp
Managed to get a population of 36,000 in 1,800 km2 according to their data for Riyadh,SA which actually has a population of 4.8 million
Something tells me the gridded dataset has some ‘flaws’.
Hey Lucia,
I’ve reproduced your graph with the actual synthetic MSU data. As expected, the A1B trend is noticeably higher.
Chad–
Thanks. Yep. When data is compared to the real projections, the models look even poorer…..
carrot eater (Comment#37436)-Something tells me that sod didn’t have that in mind (it’s a highly technical point that I am glad you pointed out, but sod seems to be saying what I said was just wrong, completely, and not close to the truth).
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actually i was thinking of similar things.
the mechanism that you did describe IS the mechanism that is heating the atmosphere. for example a warm ocean will heat the air above it, which will mix with the much bigger amount of cool air in the atmosphere. this has a real warming effect.
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UHI is different, because the actual effect is small. but there can be a correlation between growing towns (and UHI) and the thermometers being placed in exactly these towns.
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it is like attaching bigger and bigger candles below the thermometers, because the people who read them are getting older and lose eyesight. the effect on the temperature of the atmosphere would be zero. the effect on the trend could be important.
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I think sod probably meant the latter; any UHI measured by satellites is real global warming so to speak, since satellites give no preferential treatment to cities.
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yes. and it is AGW.
“short answer: no.
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the effect is pretty small, even on the record of thermometers directly affected by it.”
——————————————————————-
http://www.epa.gov/heatisland/
“…The annual mean air temperature of a city with 1 million people or more can be 1.8–5.4°F (1–3°C) warmer than its surroundings. In the evening, the difference can be as high as 22°F (12°C)…”
Sheesh, 1-3 deg C normally gets everyone’s panties in a wad, and I know 12 deg C is mind-blowing.
Maybe you meant to say that UHI has a small effect on the global average temperature record, or that some/many thermometers are sited well enough in urban areas to limit the UHI?
Carrick (Comment#37442) March 10th, 2010 at 4:57 pm
“The US uses around 1e20 Joules of energy per year, that works out to about 3 trillion watts, divide by area of continental US (7.6 million km2)… I get around 0.4 W/m2 (keep in mind this is only over 4% of the Earth’s surface). Obviously you need to include these numbers in regional scale climate simulations.”
However, a non-trivial proportion of this energy consumption does not end up as heat. Energy used in smelting metal, for example, is mainly breaking the chemical bonds of an oxide to produce a pure metal.
Really? Are the metal processors that efficient? (Honest question btw.)
But seriously, a lot of the heat does end up as heat. In later processing of metals, where material is heated, processed at high temperature, and resolidified, I’m sure that heat is not perfectly recaptured during solidication and used to heat new metal to be processed. The 2nd law of thermo makes it impossible to perfectly recapture all energy and other practical matters mean it would be costly to recapture even half.
I think it’s safe to say that most energy usage ends up as waste heat, sooner or later.
But Carrick’s number doesn’t extrapolate to the globe, as he says; globally I think it’s a full order of magnitude lower. Oceans, and much lower energy use per capita elsewhere. How much does it matter then, regionally? If you zoom in to higher resolution, Carrick’s number would be even higher in little patches; lower most elsewhere. So maybe waste heat has a higher contribution to UHI than I was expecting.
Alex Heyworth (Comment#37487),
Nah, it’s a trivial portion that does not end up as heat.
.
Sure, a bit of electrical energy is bound up in chemical structures (aluminum smelting of course, but also production of chlorine/caustic soda/hydrogen, and a few other processes). Maybe at the outside these uses represent 6% or so of electrical consumption. But these processes are by no means 100% efficient, so the bound energy must be significantly lower. Consider the overall thermal efficiency of electricity production/transmission/use: probably in the range of 30%. Consider also that electricity represents only ~25% of total energy production. So the chemically bound fraction of total energy use is somewhere less than: 0.06 * 0.30 * 0.25 = 0.45%. It’s just a rounding error.
Off topic comment: What exactly does sod have against CAPITAL LETTERS?
By the way, the net impact on albedo from humans is a net negative forcing (due to agriculture and deforrestation I believe). That would suggest that regional effects of human activity on the climate are profound. (Hm.. wonder if somebody’s made a surface map of AGW albedo change and net regional changes in total forcing… That’d be pretty cool)
SteveF–
The same thing Eli has against using first person?
lucia (Comment#37519),
Could be: Both perfect cases of style over substance.
” The 2nd law of thermo makes it impossible to perfectly recapture all energy and other practical matters mean it would be costly to recapture even half.”
But I thought that CO2 was the greatest insulator of all time? Why isn’t it being pumped into every crack and crevice to recapture all that energy? 🙂 It’s only 0.04% of the atmosphere yet you give so much power! Since no one has patented CO2 for thermal insulation purposes….hmm hmmm hmmm. hee hee.
OT: Hey! How are those thermometers working in Mongolia? Scratch 2 million livestock farts off the charts because…
A deadly winter in Mongolia has killed off more than 2 million animals, crippling the livelihoods of tens of thousands of families that depend on their livestock to make a living, and restricting their access to basic necessities, such has food, fuel and medical care, reported the Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA). 03 Mar 2010 And the Mongols are no strangers to cold harsh weather!
200 manatees perished in the cold in Florida last month
20 patients at Havana Psychiatric Hospital died in the cold there too.
Three of the five Great Lakes are almost totally frozen over. Lake Erie is totally frozen, Superior about 98% and Huron about 85% frozen
All this freezing and death happening and you’re focusing on tenths of degrees of “heat”. If these headlines had “warm” “hot” “unusual hot” in them… it would mean something huh?
Carrick (Comment#37513),
“Hm.. wonder if somebody’s made a surface map of AGW albedo change and net regional changes in total forcing…”
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I don’t know, but one very well known geographical area (the lower 48 of the USA!) has undergone enormous economic development over the last 100 years, and also (I think) shows significantly less warming than the global trend. Coincidence?
liza (Comment#37524),
Weather is not climate. Cold will continue to kill many more people and animals than heat, even if the average surface temperature increases by several degrees.
.
This winter record cold weather in Florida killed many millions of fish, because the temperature in shallow water in fell by as much as 10C below the normal winter minimum. I counted more than 100 within 20 feet of my boat dock. The cold killed lots of manatees too, but nuclear power plant cooling water outlets saved many by raising the local water temperature by ~5-10C; hundreds of manatees congregate near the outlets. Who says nuclear power isn’t environmentally friendly?
SteveF “hundreds of manatees congregate near the outlets. Who says nuclear power isn’t environmentally friendly?”
That’s good to hear.
Sheesh. I know the cold is weather and is not climate, climate is weather over time however!…and the opposite is also true: hot temps are also just weather! I hear and read “record warm” all the time “record warm summer” “hottest summer” in global warming alarm articles. You can’t deny it that. Well we are having a “record cold winter”. That should cause just as much alarm if things and people are dying but no, you get “that’s just weather”. In the meantime I think I’ve read the White House in quiet /secret has put a hold on offshore oil drilling.
Sheesh. I know the cold is weather and is not climate, climate is weather over time however!…and the opposite is also true: hot temps are also just weather! I hear and read “record warm†all the time “record warm summer†“hottest summer†in global warming alarm articles. You can’t deny it that. Well we are having a “record cold winterâ€. That should cause just as much alarm if things and people are dying but no, you get “that’s just weatherâ€.
.
no.
.
we are experiencing a globally extremely HOT winter. the idea that cold weather at a few places should dominate the reporting is simply stupid.
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but actually it does. news and “sceptic” blogs are full with cold weather reports (watts didn t really write anything else all winter long)
“we are experiencing a globally extremely HOT winter”
This is almost the funniest thing I’ve read in the intrawebs today.
sod,
Do you understand that ‘we’ don’t ‘experience’ things ‘globally’?
Andrew
“…we are experiencing a globally extremely HOT winter. the idea that cold weather at a few places should dominate the reporting is simply stupid…”
Yeah, but if we are experiencing a globally extremely COOL season, hot weather at a few places seems to dominate the reporting. And it’s not considered “weather” but part of “climate.”
Extremely hot winter? What is it that makes it extremely “hot” exactly? Is it like, summer? Or is sod reigning champion of hyperbole like always?
Andrew’s New Poem
HOT WINTER
I cooked my breakfast
On the ice, you know
To warm my tushie
I sat in the snow 😉
Andrew
Carrick (Comment#37513),
“Hm.. wonder if somebody’s made a surface map of AGW albedo change and net regional changes in total forcing…â€
Try pielke sr
http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2008/08/08/sensitivity-of-summer-near-surface-temperatures-and-precipitation-in-the-eastern-united-states-to-historical-land-cover-changes-since-european-settlement-by-strack-et-al/
SteveF (Comment#37527):
It is not so clear that cold kills more people than heat (at least in the U.S.).
-Chip
Also, it’s not a “few places”-the cold weather is in places where a lot of people live. But let’s report the weather only where it has no impact on people. Yeah that makes sense.
Chip:
Depends on what you mean by “cold”.
There are more winter illness related deaths than summer ones for sure…. something between 30-50,000 deaths from influenza for example.
Carrick (Comment#37560):
What you say is true. More people die in the winter than in the summer, but what “cold” has to do with it is much more uncertain.
As you point out, influenza is one the primary reasons why…but there is virtually no relationship between how bad a flu season we have and how cold it is.
-Chip
Andrew_FL (Comment#37552) March 11th, 2010 at 12:53 pm
“Also, it’s not a “few placesâ€-the cold weather is in places where a lot of people live. But let’s report the weather only where it has no impact on people. Yeah that makes sense.”
I’d just be happy if instead of saying “weather is not climate” at the top of all those posts, Watts actually heeded it. A couple months of cold in one region and warmth in the adjacent region is just weather. Don’t say or imply it’s anything more.
Chip:
I think there must be, otherwise it wouldn’t be centered on January through March.
Carrick (Comment#37580)-I seem to recall that the relationship has something to do with people spending more time indoors and thus in closer contact with others from whom they might get infected.
Note that the seasonality of influenza is present everywhere, no matter what the absolute climate is, because people spend more time indoors in weather that is subjectively (as opposed to objectively) cold. This is quite different from a physical link to temperature.
lucia (Comment#37502)
“Really? Are the metal processors that efficient? (Honest question btw.)”
Quite a lot of primary smelting is actually carbon neutral. Aluminium often is produced using hydropower, since before the rise of the carbon credit industry this was the cheapest power source available for their molten salt electrowinning cells, and Al smelters like long term contracts. Some producers have bought dams to safeguard their supply. A lot of zinc production likewise uses hydropower, since even wet electrowinning uses a lot of electrons.
Primary copper smelting is another one – so much energy is produced burning CuFeS2 with air that the copper comes out molten. Some energy is used in the electrorefining step but it is tiny (mainly overcoming cell resistance).
Most of the rest of the metals use carbon both for energy and to abstract oxygen from the metal oxides. The steel industry is quite worried as they produce a lot of CO2 from 3C + 2Fe2O3 -> 4Fe + 3CO2.
““we are experiencing a globally extremely HOT winter—
I missed that one. Holy cow!
“we are experiencing a globally extremely HOT winterâ€
And it has a name: “El Nino”
Re: Bruce of Newcastle (Mar 11 16:51),
The carbon anodes in an aluminum plant are slowly consumed, so even with hydropower it’s not completely carbon neutral. Fun fact about Al: the tip of the Washington Monument is made from aluminum. At the time it was a very rare and expensive metal.
I also think we all need to get used to past tense. I think NH meteorlogical winter is Dec. Jan. Feb. It’s spring now! (The equinox is soon too.)
lucia (Comment#37614),
” It’s spring now!”
Always the optimist! 🙂
.
But you are right. When I lived the the north I worried about the thermal (as opposed to ‘official’) dates for the seasons. My recollection is that ‘thermal spring’ in North America begins on March 6… so you are four days into spring. Daffodils can’t be mistaken about such things.
DeWitt Payne (Comment#37609)
March 11th, 2010 at 5:19 pm
DeWitt may have been slightly tongue-in-cheek, but the carbon anodes actually produce CF4 from the fluoride molten salt electrolyte. Quite a potent ghg, ‘though they’ve been working diligently to reduce emissions (at least the ones that haven’t been off-shored).
Chip Knappenberger (Comment#37547)
March 11th, 2010 at 12:18 pm
“It is not so clear that cold kills more people than heat (at least in the U.S.).”
I don’t claim to know the statistics on heat vs cold related deaths, but I’ve lived where its hot and cold. The cold is way more dangerous. Here in ND it’s common in the winter to have 30-40mph winds with -20 to -30 F. It will kill quickly and does so every winter. Could it be there are more people that live where it’s hot and so more die from heat than cold?
“we are experiencing a globally extremely HOT winter. the idea that cold weather at a few places should dominate the reporting is simply stupid.”
.
Not in Argentina. It’s still summer here.;<)
Maybe we could put it this way. There is more of the earth that is uninhabitable because it is cold than warm. Compare the barren north v. the teeming tropics
The British Met Office forecast a Warm Winter 2009/10 in the UK. They have now decided to drop their long range forecasts cos they have been so wrong lately. In case you don’t know, the UK winter has been very unusually cold, not warm.
The warm in the global data comes from SST which lag.
“You can’t deny it that.”
Best summary of denialism I’ve ever read. “You can’t deny it that.” Captures their essence, to be sure.
Liza (Comment#37537) March 11th, 2010 at 10:50 am
You are verging on the weird, now. They are also going to ban fishing and guns, and set up death squads.
according to the 5.2 UAH data, the last winter was the warmest on record.
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http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/compress:3
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and the only 3 month period warmer was spring 1998.
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i see, you folks prefer to ignore this.
sod,
.
Sure, I am a willing to bet that most posters here believe that we will gradually break records as a result of CO2 induced warming.
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But the question is not whether we are warming. The question is have the climate models got CO2 sensitivity right. The consistent over prediction of warming suggests that they have a CO2 sensitivity that is too high.
SteveF (Comment#37507) March 11th, 2010 at 7:58 am
“Nah, it’s a trivial portion that does not end up as heat.
.
Sure, a bit of electrical energy is bound up in chemical structures (aluminum smelting of course, but also production of chlorine/caustic soda/hydrogen, and a few other processes). Maybe at the outside these uses represent 6% or so of electrical consumption. But these processes are by no means 100% efficient, so the bound energy must be significantly lower. Consider the overall thermal efficiency of electricity production/transmission/use: probably in the range of 30%. Consider also that electricity represents only ~25% of total energy production. So the chemically bound fraction of total energy use is somewhere less than: 0.06 * 0.30 * 0.25 = 0.45%. It’s just a rounding error.”
Quite a few errors in your screed here, I’m afraid. Electricity generation in the US accounts for 40.1% of energy use, industrial energy use (which includes electricity generation for industrial plants) a further 20.6%. (http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/pecss_diagram.html)
In Al smelting, approximately 60% of the energy consumed is embedded in the resulting aluminum. In addition to the processes you’ve mentioned, cement plants, brick production, tire production,glass production, zinc and copper smelting etc etc are significant power users. I know the US is not the industrial hub it once was, but significant levels of these activities still continue. Large industrial processes such as these tend to be built next door to power stations so as to minimize transmission losses. In return they get cheaper power.
So all in all, I don’t believe your little sum purporting to estimate how much of US energy use ends up embedded. I’d agree it is probably below 10%, but definitely not below 1%. Wrong order of magnitude. Maybe you consider <10% trivial. I would say definitely not, especially considering the extremely high level of US energy use.
sod (Comment#37667)-See I shut you off at “version 5.2”-the new version is available now so why not analyze that?
However, in case I was paying attention…Warm winter is proof of anything…how exactly? You still haven’t explained why a weather event should suddenly be climate.
British winter was the coldest for 31 years
Met Office figures recorded a December-to-February mean UK temperature of just 1.51C, while the 1971-2000 average is 3.7C
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/mar/02/british-winter-coldest-30-years
Where’s that globally hot winter/spring/whatever?
Certainly not here. The temps in the middle of Europe refuse to move up from 0 Celsius for weeks! And I still wasn’t able to switch my fur coat for something lighter. And it’s snowing again as I write…
Alex Heyworth (Comment#37671),
Well, your are right about the % energy used for electricity in the USA, but I assumed you were talking about world wide use, where I think the profile is somewhat different. Metal smelting does bind a fair fraction of the energy used in the product (especially aluminum), but aluminum represents only about 3% of worldwide electrical use. Other electrical smelting processes use very much less. Production of iron/steel also binds energy in the product, but not nearly so much as aluminum (per Kg), and the overall efficiency of the coke based reduction process is much higher (with no intermediate production of electricity). The energy used in other industrial processes is substantial, but very little of this energy ends up bound in the product. Cement production uses a lot heat in kilns of course, but the fraction permanently bound up is very low, since much of the initially bound heat is released when the resulting concrete sets (and the cement hydrates). Perhaps the chemically bound energy reaches 1%-2% of the total in the USA, but it no way is it near 10%.
Re: EW (Mar 12 05:35),
Chicago snow is melted! It’s beautiful out!
Raven–
I sure as shootin’ do! The question is will it be as fast as predicted?
RE: sod (Comment#37667)
according to the 5.2 UAH data, the last winter was the warmest on record.
.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/compress:3
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and the only 3 month period warmer was spring 1998.
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i see, you folks prefer to ignore this.
– Sod, I suspect that the high average global temperatures since January are a combination of El Nino and the strongly negative Arctic Oscillation.
Look at central northern Canada and Greenland and you see sustained anomalies of up to +6C (although it is still very cold!).
Could it be that the role of the negative AO in driving up current global average temperature is not getting the attention it deserves?
Are we perhaps reading too much into an unusual confluence of weather events?
Just a thought.
DeWitt Payne (Comment#37609)
“The carbon anodes in an aluminum plant are slowly consumed”
Oops, thanks, I forgot about the anodes. I’ve never worked in Al smelting, but have in Zn and others where the anodes produce O2.
John M (Comment#37642)
“…the carbon anodes actually produce CF4”
Only a tiny amount as otherwise replacing the cryolite would be prohibitively expensive. The cells are fed with Al2O3, and the oxygen goes with the carbon from the anodes to produce CO2 as DeWitt gently reminded me.
Could someone please explain what the satelites are measuring, by that I mean, the temperature of what?
Is it the average temperature at ground level that we inhabit, or the average temperature of the average height of the air column between earth and satelite or what?
How does cloud cover affect that measurement?
Are the clouds transperant to heat (or temperature?).
I would have said no – not transperant, but that is by subjective observation only.
I realise the satelites are very accurate and well disbursed throught the globe and much less subject to the problems of earth bound thermometers.
But just what’s temperature are they measuring?
SteveF (Comment#37691),
Well, we are maybe agreed on the order of magnitude now 🙂 Happy to leave it at that myself.
Darwin in Argentina – Hi –
Summer has just ended in Australia.
It started very hot here – about the time of Copenhagen – record temperatures in Adelaide in particular.
Since then it has been quite mild but very humid.
Lately it has been very wet with record rain in some places and extensive flooding.
Similar to the record snow in northern hemisphere.
My family have been graziers and farmers since the 1850’s in the same part of north west New South Wales.
This is the third cycle of prolonged drought and heatwaves, followed by flooding, that they have experienced.
That coincides with the 65 year cycles evidenced in the NCDC version of global temperature.
These cycles are superimposed on top of the gentle long term upward linear trend.
That’s why I am puzzled that Lucia is expecting further warming.
The NCDC data does not show any upkick due to CO2, once you remove the 65 year zig-zag cycle.
If the cycles continue, the next move will be down.
However if this set of cycles is finished, as suggested by sunspot research, then we may be headed for a secular down turn.
That is too early to tell, but the work of physicists studying the detail of what goes on within the sun are pointing in that direction.
Bruce of Newcastle (Comment#37841)
March 12th, 2010 at 7:47 pm
Yes, but a tiny amount goes a long way.
http://www.world-aluminium.org/?pg=100
It used to be closer to 1:1. (Actually, I learned a lot looking up Al production myself…I had no idea the anodes were consumed stoichiometrically.)
Re: Ausie Dan (Mar 12 21:58),
Have a look here, Dr. Roy tells all
Re: sod (Mar 12 00:38),
At least you recognize the limitations of the “on record” part of that statement. Or maybe you don’t. Who knows?
With March readings looking very high so far, and with this new version of UAH out, what are the chances that the 12 month moving average hits a record high when the June readings come out? Looks like the 1998 uber El Nino record will fall as the hottest 12 months in the database.
And 2009/2010 will have done it with only a moderate El Nino impact, not to mention low solar impacts, and a record AO impacting land areas in North America and Europe.
Looks like UAH is catching up to the other anomaly databases as the ocean contributes some of its massive heat buildup to the atmosphere.
As for anecdotal evidence: Here in Seattle, the weather continues unusually warm after the warmest average temperature in January in Seattle history.