Well, there ya go. Maybe that's our problem. Graphs confuse them. Must be fundamentalists and not technicians. The trend ain't their friend. (There is a graph in the first link; that ain't good)
2005 warmest ever year in north
By Richard Black
Environment Correspondent, BBC News website
We're right, the sceptics are wrong
Dr David Viner
This year has been the warmest on record in the northern hemisphere, say scientists in Britain.
It is the second warmest globally since the 1860s, when reliable records began, they say.
Ocean temperatures recorded in the northern hemisphere Atlantic Ocean have also been the hottest on record.
The researchers, from the UK Met Office and the University of East Anglia, say this is more evidence for the reality of human-induced global warming.
Their data show that the average temperature during 2005 in the northern hemisphere is 0.65 Celsius above the average for 1961-1990, a conventional baseline against which scientists compare temperatures.
The global increase is 0.48 Celsius, making 2005 the second warmest year on record behind 1998, though the 1998 figure was inflated by strong El Nino conditions.
The northern hemisphere is warming faster than the south, scientists believe, because a greater proportion of it is land, which responds faster to atmospheric conditions than ocean.
Northern hemisphere temperatures are now about 0.4 Celsius higher than a decade ago.
"The data also show that the sea surface temperature in the northern hemisphere Atlantic is the highest since 1880," said Dr David Viner from the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia (UEA).
Error bar
No measurements of average temperature can be completely accurate, and David Viner believes the team's calculations are subject to an error of about plus or minus 0.1 Celsius.
However, he says, the long-term trend is clearly upwards — rapidly over the last decade — indicating the reality of human-induced global warming.
"We're right, the sceptics are wrong," he told the BBC News website.
"It's simple physics; more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, emissions growing on a global basis, and consequently increasing temperatures."
However, Fred Singer from the Science & Environmental Policy Project in Washington DC, a centre of the "climate sceptics" community, disputed this interpretation.
"If indeed 2005 is the warmest northern hemisphere year since 1860, all this proves is that 2005 is the warmest northern hemisphere year since 1860," he told the BBC News website.
"It doesn't prove anything else, and certainly cannot be used by itself to prove that the cause of warming is the emission of greenhouse gases.
"It requires a more subtle examination to know how much of warming is due to man-made causes — there must be some — and how much is down to natural causes."
Eight of the 10 warmest years since 1860 have occurred within the last decade. ...and below the fold, ..
2005 was warmest year on record: NASA
Sea ice floats within the 1002 Area of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in this undated handout photo provided by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Alaska Image Library. Last year was the warmest recorded on Earth's surface, and it was unusually hot in the Arctic, U.S. space agency NASA said on Tuesday.
Photo: HANDOUT/U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Alaska Image Library
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Last year was the warmest recorded on Earth's surface, and it was unusually hot in the Arctic, U.S. space agency NASA said on Tuesday.
All five of the hottest years since modern record-keeping began in the 1890s occurred within the last decade, according to analysis by NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies.
In descending order, the years with the highest global average annual temperatures were 2005, 1998, 2002, 2003 and 2004, NASA said in a statement.
"It's fair to say that it probably is the warmest since we have modern meteorological records," said Drew Shindell of the NASA institute in New York City.
"Using indirect measurements that go back farther, I think it's even fair to say that it's the warmest in the last several thousand years."
Some researchers had expected 1998 would be the hottest year on record, notably because a strong El Nino -- a warm-water pattern in the eastern Pacific -- boosted global temperatures.
But Shindell said last year was slightly warmer than 1998, even without any extraordinary weather pattern. Temperatures in the Arctic were unusually warm in 2005, NASA said.
"That very anomalously warm year (1998) has become the norm," Shindell said in a telephone interview.
"The rate of warming has been so rapid that this temperature that we only got when we had a real strong El Nino now has become something that we've gotten without any unusual worldwide weather disturbance."
Over the past 30 years, Earth has warmed by 1.08 degrees F (0.6 degrees C), NASA said. Over the past 100 years, it has warmed by 1.44 degrees F (0.8 degrees C).
Shindell, in line with the view held by most scientists, attributed the rise to emissions of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, methane and ozone, with the burning of fossil fuels being the primary source.
The 21st century could see global temperature increases of 6 to 10 degrees F (3 to 5 degrees C), Shindell said.
"That will really bring us up to the warmest temperatures the world has experienced probably in the last million years," he said.
To understand whether the Earth is cooling or warming, scientists use data from weather stations on land, satellite measurements of sea surface temperature since 1982, and data from ships for earlier years.
More information and images are available online at: nasa.gov.
thewe.cc
Meanwhile, down under,
Australia's hottest year on record
Australia has officially recorded its warmest year on record. Data collected by the Bureau of Meteorology indicate that the nation’s annual mean temperature for 2005 was 1.09°C above the standard 1961-90 average, making it the warmest year since reliable, widespread temperature observations became available in 1910. The previous record of +0.84°C was set in 1998. While these temperature departures may seem relatively small, a 1°C increase in mean temperatures is equivalent to many southern Australian towns shifting northward by about 100km.
A record mean temperature was set because both daytime and night-time temperatures were high: the annual mean maximum temperature was 1.21°C above average (equal highest), while the mean minimum temperature was 0.97°C above average (2nd highest). Temperature anomalies varied throughout the year but autumn 2005 was particularly warm. April had the largest Australian mean monthly temperature anomaly ever recorded, with a monthly anomaly of +2.58°C breaking the previous record of +2.32°C set in June 1996.
bom.gov.au |
