Integrating federal research on global change and climate change

Philip B Duffy, Senior Policy Analyst,
Office of Science and Technology Policy, Executive Office of the President

This week, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) released temperature data showing that 2011 was one of the warmest years since record-keeping began in 1880.  The global temperature continued to be extremely warm even though at least two factors acted to push it downwards in the short term.

Despite a slight drop of about 0.2°F from 2010—which had tied with 2005 for the warmest year ever recorded—the data show that Earth continues to experience warmer temperatures than a few decades ago. NOAA’s analysis ranked 2011 as the 11^th warmest year, while NASA’s showed 2011 to be the 9^th warmest (rankings are expected to differ slightly because temperature differences between the warmest years are extremely small). Both rankings are consistent with a clear trend of increasing global temperatures—with the 12 hottest years on record all occurring since 1997, and the decade that started in 2000 the hottest in recorded history.

Still, the data also show that temperatures have not changed much since 2005, the year that tied 2010 as the warmest ever recorded. If temperatures have not risen recently, does that mean climate change has stopped?  Actually, no.  Just as stock prices do not go up every day in a bull market, global temperatures do not rise every year in an era of warming.  In both cases, to understand if an upward trend will continue, one must look at the underlying forces that drive it.

In the case of climate change, the most important underlying force is increasing amounts of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.  This results primarily from human burning of fossil fuels (coal, oil, and natural gas).  Fossil fuel use not only continues, but is growing.  And because carbon dioxide, the most important greenhouse gas, remains in the atmosphere for many decades, the amount in the atmosphere increases even in those unusual years when emissions are flat or decrease slightly.  For example when global carbon dioxide emissions dipped by about 1% as a result of the recent global recession, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere—which is the force that drives temperature—continued to increase.  And in most years emissions increase, so the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere increases at an even greater rate.

So why don’t temperatures go up every year? Because although increasing greenhouse gases are the most important force driving the global temperature, they are not the only force.  Weather variations, for example, push the global temperature up or down slightly every year.  Powerful volcanic eruptions can cause noticeable cooling for a couple of years.  And the energy output of the sun varies slightly (although since satellite measurements started in 1980 there has been no steady up or down trend in the sun).  These and other forces cause global temperatures to vary slightly from year to year.  To get a reliable indication of trends, one needs to consider at least a decade or two.

It’s noteworthy that 2011 was very warm despite two temporary cooling influences. The figure below shows that global temperatures were high in 2011 even though a weather variation known as La Niña caused colder than average temperatures over much of the Pacific Ocean.  (La Niña is a temporary cooling of temperatures in the Eastern tropical Pacific region, which has widespread impacts, including a slight global cooling.)  And between about 2005 and 2010 the sun’s energy output was lower than ever recorded, which also pushed temperatures down a little.  Both these forces are likely to reverse—in fact the sun’s energy output already has—which can be expected to drive future temperatures upwards in coming years.

Although the temperatures discussed above, which are measured just above the ground or ocean, are the most common way to gauge the global temperature, other data can be useful as well.  In particular, the “ocean heat content,” which involves ocean temperatures from the surface down to about 6,000 feet, is less susceptible to year-to-year variations.  This shows a steady march upwards, with each of the last 10 years setting a new record.

The continued high temperatures—despite downward pressure from La Niña and the sun, together with ongoing increases in atmospheric greenhouse gases and ocean heat content—show that global warming continues.

Figure: Map showing 2011 temperatures as differences from the long-term average of 1971 through 2000.  Red indicates warmer than average temperatures, blue colder than average.  Colder than average temperatures in the Pacific Ocean region show the influence of La Niña, a common weather variation.  Despite this strong temporary cooling influence, global temperatures remained very high in 2011.

Related Links

NASA News Release: NASA Finds 2011 Ninth Warmest Year on Record

NOAA News Release: 2011 A Year of Climate Extremes in the United States