Monday, February 3, 2014

Skeptical Science thinks 0.09°C ocean warming since 1957 can't fit on a graph

The Skeptical Science kidz are up to their usual paid-propaganda tactics with a new post claiming that a much bigger graph is needed to show the 0.09°C global ocean warming over the past 55 years [Levitus et al 2012]. Apparently, they think making a graph larger will create a bigger impact from the tiny hundredths-of-a-degree world ocean warming since 1957, rather than adjusting the axis scale.  

As usual, their post carefully avoids mentioning that the temperature change of the surface to 2000 meters depth of the global oceans was only 0.09°C over 55 years, as was clearly stated in the Levitus et al 2012 paper from which their post and graph was derived, instead only displaying the data in scary and 'sciencey' sounding Joules and Hiroshima bombs [and previously, as kitten sneezes].

Furthermore, they claim ocean warming has not 'paused' and continues to accelerate, however, ocean heat content observations since the deployment of the ARGO float system in 2004, which provide much higher quality data show a slowing of ocean heat content change, even after the ARGO data was up-justed by Josh Willis from a cooling trend to a warming trend. 

The boyz are also very careful not to mention that:
I wonder why?

Ocean heat content 0-700 meters has plateaued since ~2004, when much higher quality data became available from the ARGO float system. Data shown after up-justed from cooling to warming trend by Josh Willis of NASA/JPL

The Oceans Warmed up Sharply in 2013: We're Going to Need a Bigger Graph

Posted on 31 January 2014 by Rob Painting

Because the oceans cover some 71% of the Earth's surface and are capable of retaining heat around a thousand times that of the atmosphere, the oceans are where most of the energy from global warming is going - 93.4% over recent decades. So greenhouse gases emitted by human industrial activity not only cause more heat to become trapped in the atmospherethey also cause more of the sun's energy to accumulate in the oceans.
Long-term the oceans have been gaining heat at a rate equivalent to about 2 Hiroshima bombs per second, although this has increased over the last 16 or so years to around 4 per second. In 2013 ocean warming rapidly escalated, rising to a rate in excess of 12 Hiroshima bombs per second - over three times the recent trend. This doesn't necessarily mean we are entering a period of greatly accelerated ocean warming, as there is substantial year-to-year variation in heat uptake by the oceans. It does, however, once again dispel the persistent myth of a pause in global warming, because the Earth has actually continued to warm faster in the last 16 years than it did in the preceding 16 years. [yeah right]
As can be seen in Figure 1 below, the global oceans have warmed so quickly in 2013 that the National Oceanographic Data Center (NODC) is going to need a bigger graph.         

Figure 1 - Ocean Heat Content data  for the 0-2000 metre layer (based on Levitus [2012]) for the period 1957-2013. 

3 comments:

  1. I have visited Skeptical science many times and have yet to see any scepticism or any true science, for that matter.

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    1. So true, and if you try to post a comment that is a serious challenge to their AGW religion, they delete it or edit it later! They deleted several of my comments, so I don't bother to comment there.

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  2. SkS is an internet echo chamber in which the sound of Cook, NooseyTelly and Painting patting each other on the back is often mistaken for clapping.

    ReplyDelete