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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsNo more pause: Warming will be non-stop from now on
by Michael Slezak
Enjoy the pause in global warming while it lasts, because it's probably the last one we will get this century. Once temperatures start rising again, it looks like they will keep going up without a break for the rest of the century, unless we cut our greenhouse gas emissions.
The slowdown in global warming since 1997 seems to be driven by unusually powerful winds over the Pacific Ocean, which are burying heat in the water. But even if that happens again, or a volcanic eruption spews cooling particles into the air, we are unlikely to see a similar hiatus, according to two independent studies.
Masahiro Watanabe of the University of Tokyo in Japan and his colleagues have found that, over the past three decades, the natural ups and downs in temperature have had less influence on the planet's overall warmth. In the 1980s, natural variability accounted for almost half of the temperature changes seen. That fell to 38 per cent in the 1990s and just 27 per cent in the 2000s.
Instead, human-induced warming is accounting for more and more of the changes from year to year, says Watanabe. With ever-faster warming, small natural variations have less impact and are unlikely to override the human-induced warming.
more
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn26122-no-more-pause-warming-will-be-nonstop-from-now-on.html
AverageJoe90
(10,745 posts)Emissions may keep rising for a while, but they seem to suggest that hiatuses will likely suddenly stop existing at all(or at least become much shorter) if we hit a certain threshold by 2030. Here's the problem: this seems to assume a rather linear warming scenario.....which hasn't exactly panned out in real life, as we've all seen, for those of us who've actually looked at the data.
So I think it's safe to say that the jury's still out on this for now.
immoderate
(20,885 posts)The article says that AGW will increase enough to supersede natural variations. The "hiatus" took advantage of the fact that 1998 was an unusually hot year in the atmosphere. Beware of all climate studies that begin with 1998.
Jury went home already.
--imm
AverageJoe90
(10,745 posts)Yes, I do realize that natural variations will be superseded at some point; just so we're clear, I wasn't arguing against that at all.
But, TBH, this is the first time I've ever heard it claimed that hiatuses will just suddenly become much smaller or stop altogether once we hit a certain threshold. I suppose it may be theoretically possible, but it's also clear that much more research is needed to support this particular hypothesis.
immoderate
(20,885 posts)To be sure, the heat has to go somewhere.
--imm
XemaSab
(60,212 posts)n/t
Notafraidtoo
(402 posts)Right wing think tank employee? or Free republic troll hobbyist? Everyone of your post are like this, amazing you haven't been banned.
AverageJoe90
(10,745 posts)Frankly, I'm sorry if I don't toe the line that perhaps you'd like me to toe. I do believe climate change is a problem we need to tackle, but I don't have my hair all on fire at the same time. I'm also willing to think critically as well; not every single piece of research is going to necessarily be 100% accurate. Even the IPCC has had to revise things sometimes.
Cleita
(75,480 posts)rickyhall
(4,889 posts)No pause in Texas either.
AverageJoe90
(10,745 posts)Just thought I'd point that out. Not often we dip down in the 70s for daily highs, in late July of all times of the year. But I guess it does give a little credence to the idea of "global weirding".
Response to rickyhall (Reply #3)
Name removed Message auto-removed
cheapdate
(3,811 posts)The increase in the global mean surface temperature over the past few years has been at the low end of the range predicted by climate models. North America had a mild winter last year. Europe was brutally cold.
Bohunk68
(1,364 posts)average winter until March and then March was one of the coldest in my 33 years of keeping records here. That Polar Vortex thing and it is fully operative this summer. Not one day over 90 this August. Didn't use the A/C once. That only indicates a short term thing, IMHO.
freedom fighter jh
(1,782 posts)It's explained a couple of graphs in: *slowdown* in warming. So even with the "pause," temperatures are still getting warmer overall. Maybe just not as fast as they did at some point.
AverageJoe90
(10,745 posts)nomorenomore08
(13,324 posts)Cleita
(75,480 posts)are suffering but the bugs and other critters that depend on our watering to grab drops of water.
daleanime
(17,796 posts)Bohunk68
(1,364 posts)in Upstate NY about 45 minutes west of Albany. I have been keeping my own records since Nov.1980. For the past three years I have been posting my monthly results on my fb page. August stats were: Temp - 65.39F Overall avg for August is 68.82F. This is my third coldest August and there were no days over 90F. Precip was 3.5" YTD 32.8" Long term avg is 4.22" for the month and YTD 34.69". 2012 and 2013 were below avg. precip and this year is following suit. For the last 10 years I have recorded below avg. snowfall. We had been on a wetter trend, but after Hurricanes Irene and Lee, it is going the opposite direction. Overall, the average temp has gone up 1.6F per day since 1980. So, where we may be going is still to be shown, although hotter and drier may be an answer. We shall see, because weather is not simple, it is far more complex when taking world-wide data into account. Sometimes, I really wish I had maybe a 100,000 years worth to compare.
AverageJoe90
(10,745 posts)But there's definitely been some weirding as well; this July was one of the mildest, overall, that I can remember, here in D/FW. Sure as heck beats what we had to put up with in 2011, IMO.