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Global Temperature Report, 1978 - 2003 the University of Alabama in Huntsville Global Temperature Report, 1978 - 2003 The University of Alabama in Huntsville Global Temperature Report 1978 - 2003 Earth System Science Center The University of Alabama in Huntsville Dr. John Christy & Dr. Roy Spencer December 8, 2003 Global Temperature Report, 1978 - 2003 The University of Alabama in Huntsville Global Temperature Report 1978 - 2003 Contents: 25 years of taking Earth’s temperature ......... p. 1 The atmosphere is warming ........................ p. 2 Confirming the temperature data .............. p. 3 Finding and correcting errors..................... p. 4 Conflicting climate data ............................ p. 5 The ongoing climate conundrum .............. p. 6 Earth’s climate is constantly changing ......... p. 7 Climate and environmental priorities....... p. 8 Map of regional climate trends ................. p. 9 Biographical information......................... p. 10 Selected research publications ................. p. 11 Monthly means of lower tropospherepp. 12-14 Global temperature report: 11/03 ..... pp. 15-16 © 2003 Earth System Science Center, The University of Alabama in Huntsville UAH is a Space Grant University. • An Affirmative Action / Equal Opportunity Institution. Global Temperature Report, 1978 - 2003 The University of Alabama in Huntsville 25 years of taking Earth’s temperature In early November 1978 a The microwave sensors “see” sensors, Spencer teamed with Dr. microwave sensor aboard the huge volumes of atmosphere — John Christy from The University National Oceanic and Atmo- about 50,000 cubic kilometers for of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH) spheric Administration’s TIROS each reading. to analyze the data. polar-orbiting satellite started The data didn’t fit the forecast They concentrated on data scanning the Earth’s atmosphere. models and, as day-to-day tools from two altitude ranges: The It was looking at the intensity for forecasters, the microwave lower troposphere, from sea level of microwaves emitted by oxygen sensors weren’t very useful. (The to about six miles high, and the molecules. Since the intensity of data has since been used to lower stratosphere above 10 those microwaves relates directly substantially improve the accu- miles. In March 1990 they pub- to the temperature of the oxygen racy of weather forecasting lished their findings in Science: molecules, they provide an accu- models.) Although global climate models rate “thermometer” for tempera- The data the sensors collected, predicted global warming due to tures in the atmosphere. however, were dutifully recorded increased CO2 in the atmosphere The National Weather Service and stored. In a decade they should show up first and strongest hoped to use that nearly global created a tremendous backlog of in the troposphere, the first ten temperature data to improve its data, including more than 500 years of satellite data showed no weather forecasts. million temperature readings. sign of warming in that layer of Unfortunately, the computer In 1989 Dr. Roy Spencer, at the atmosphere. forecasting models were designed that time a space scientist at Now, with 25 years of data in to use precise temperature data NASA’s Marshall Space Flight hand, that result has changed. from 14 designated altitudes. That Center, proposed using the micro- Spencer, R.W., and J.R. Christy, data is collected by “radiosondes,” wave data to look at global “Precise monitoring of global instruments carried aloft by atmospheric temperatures. temperature trends from satellites.” helium balloons. An expert in microwave Science, 247, 1558-1562, 1990. 1 Global Temperature Report, 1978 - 2003 The University of Alabama in Huntsville Monthly global temperature deviations from seasonal norms, in Celsius The atmosphere is warming Since Nov. 16, 1978, the global lower tropo- Compared to seasonal norms, the hottest day in sphere has warmed almost 0.2 Celsius (about 0.34° the past 25 years was April 6, 1998, when the global Fahrenheit), or global warming at the rate of ap- composite temperature climbed to 0.92 C (1.66° F) proximately 0.76 C (about 1.38° Fahrenheit) per above normal. century. April 1998 was also the warmest month, with an Most of the warming that accounts for that trend, average global composite temperature that was 0.75 however, has happened since January 1998 in the C (1.35° F) warmer than seasonal norms. northernmost third of the globe. (Please see map on The 1997-1998 “El Niño of the century” made page 9.) 1998 the hottest calendar year during the 25-year There has been no net warming in the tropics record, with an annual average temperature that was over the past 25 years, while there is very slight 0.47 C (0.85° F) warmer than normal. warming in the southernmost third of the globe. The hottest 12-month period, however, was from While the 25-year warming is within the range November 1997 through October 1998, with an of natural climate variation, some of the warming is average global composite temperature that was 0.473 consistent with human effects — especially warming C warmer than normal. in the coldest air over the Northern Hemisphere, By contrast, the coolest 12-month period was according to Christy. “That cold air has very little from June 1992 through May 1993, when the erup- water vapor in it, so if you add another greenhouse tion of the Mount Pinatubo volcano drove the gas you have an opportunity to trap more heat. average global com-posite temperature 0.28 C (0.5° “When you go to the tropics, where there’s lots F) below normal. The volcano erupted at the begin- of water vapor, the extra carbon dioxide doesn’t have ning of an El Niño warming event, which helped to as much effect. As a greenhouse gas, carbon offset the volcano’s cooling effects. dioxide’s greatest effect is in the driest, coldest The coolest calendar year was 1985, at 0.25 C places.” (0.45° F) below normal. The coolest month was Global composite temperatures were driven by September 1984, at 0.50 C (0.9° F) below normal. major climate events, including volcanic eruptions, The coldest day was September 19, 1984, when seven El Niño Pacific Ocean warming events and the global composite temperature dropped 0.67 C four La Niña Pacific Ocean cooling events. (1.21° F) below seasonal norms. 2 Global Temperature Report, 1978 - 2003 The University of Alabama in Huntsville Confirming the temperature data The UAH dataset is the only satellite-based temperature dataset that has multiple, independent studies verifying its accuracy. “Ours is the only dataset that has been compared to non-satellite data,” said Christy. “This gives us confidence in its results. Several different radio- sonde-based products have been compared to the satellite data and the results of those studies have been published.” In 1992, Christy and Spencer published a study in which they compared the satellite data to a set of U.S. radiosondes. In 1997, the Hadley Center of the United King- dom’s Meteorology Office did an analysis using data from 400 radiosonde sites around the world. There was extremely close agreement between that radio- sonde data and the UAH dataset. Additional studies comparing the satellite and Christy, J.R., R.W. Spencer, W.B. Norris, W.D. Braswell and radiosonde data have appeared in reports published D.E. Parker, “Error estimates of Version 5.0 of MSU/AMSU by the IPCC and the National Research Council. bulk atmospheric temperatures.” Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology, 2003, 20, 613-629. The most recent comparison was published in 2003 in the Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Christy, J.R., R.W. Spencer, and W.D. Braswell, “MSU Technology. In each case, the satellite data and the Tropospheric temperatures: Data set construction and radiosonde data show a high level of agreement. radiosonde comparisons.” Journal of Atmospheric and Each microwave sounding unit is also calibrated Oceanic Technology, 2000, 17, 1153-1170. before launch, using heating elements warmed to Hurrell, J., S.J. Brown, K.E. Trenberth and J.R. Christy, precise temperatures. “Comparison of tropospheric temperatures from radiosondes In space, each microwave sounding unit self- and satellites: 1979-1998.” Bulletin of the American Meteoro- calibrates every cycle. It views a warm target whose logical Society, 2000, 81, 2165-2177. temperature is precisely monitored and then deep Christy, J.R., R.W. Spencer, and D. Braswell, “How accurate space, which has a temperature near absolute zero. are satellite ‘thermometers’?” Nature, 1997, 389, 342-3. Then it takes measurements of the Earth’s atmo- Christy, J.R. and R.W. Spencer, “Assessment of precision in sphere across a swath below the spacecraft. temperatures from the Microwave Sounding Units,” Climatic Change, 1995 30, 97-102. 3 Global Temperature Report, 1978 - 2003 The University of Alabama in Huntsville Finding and correcting errors As the satellite data become longer in extent, ment differentially heat or cool due to changing various issues became apparent that needed to be shadows as the satellite’s orbit drifts. The value of dealt with to ensure the data’s long-term accuracy. the measured atmospheric temperature tends to show Spencer and Christy discovered three of the four a small spurious heating or cooling proportional to major problems that have been identified — orbital the temperature of the instrument components. drift, instrument body warming and inter-instrument UAH discovered this effect (Christy et al. 2000) calibration — found solutions to those problems and and developed a technique to remove it. A coeffi- published their results in peer-reviewed journals. cient is calculated for each satellite which — when The fourth problem, orbital decay, was identified multiplied by the change in instrument temperature by Dr. Frank Wentz, et al., and a correction tech- — determines the erroneous atmospheric tempera- nique similar to one that he and his colleagues ture effect. This error can then be removed. UAH developed has been applied to the UAH dataset. does this only when there is an obvious correlation between instrument temperatures and atmospheric Orbital drift (or precession) temperature errors.
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