NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center reported last month:
Based on preliminary data, the globally-averaged combined land and sea surface temperature was the fifth warmest on record for April, and the January-April year-to-date period tied with 2003 as the sixth warmest on record.
lt is worth noting “the El Ni±o-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) transitioned from a cold phase (La Ni±a) to ENSO-neutral conditions during April 2009,” which kept things on the coolish side. If we stay neutral (as most models currently predict), it’ll get hotter and if go into an El Ni±o (as some models predict) then we should be back to setting record temperatures.
And no, I don’t think the monthly data tell us much about the climate. But I know reporting it annoys the deniers. More seriously, it is definitely worth seeing where it is warming [click to enlarge]:
Once again, the geographical distribution of the warming continues to be really, really bad news for those worried about the land of the permafrost permamelt, where it is running upwards of 4°-5°C (7°-9°F) warmer than normal. This is worrisome because:
- NOAA recently reported: “Methane levels rose in 2008 for the second consecutive year after a 10-year lull,”
- Scientific analysis suggests the rise in 2007 methane levels came from Arctic wetlands (see here).
- Siberia contains probably the world’s largest amount of carbon locked away in the permafrost (see here).
- The permafrost is increasingly not so perma (see here).
- Much of that carbon would be released as methane, which is 23 times more potent a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.
As for what the peer-reviewed scientific literature forecasts for the next decade, temperaturewise:
- The “coming decade” (2010 to 2020) is poised to be the warmest on record, globally.
- The coming decade is poised to see faster temperature rise than any decade since the authors’ calculations began in 1960.
- The fast warming would likely begin early in the next decade “” similar to the 2007 prediction by the Hadley Center in Science (see “Climate Forecast: Hot “” and then Very Hot“).
That is why they call it global warming.
Related Posts:
- NOAA: Eighth warmest winter on record, this summer may be a hot one
- Breaking news: Unprecedented global warming in past year
- Very warm 2008 makes this the hottest decade in recorded history by far
- Sorry deniers, Hadley Center and WMO say 2000s are easily the hottest decade in recorded history
- Yes, the globe is warming. But how fast?
- This just in: Great Ice Age of 2008 is STILL over
- “Hadley Center to deniers: We are STILL warming”
- Hansen throws cold water on cooling climate claim
- Where is the media on the incredible warming and extreme weather of February?
- Media enable denier spin 1: A (sort of) cold January doesn’t mean climate stopped warming
- No warming since 1998? Get real, deniers!
- NASA: 2007 Second Warmest Year Ever, with Record Warmth Likely by 2010
Previous in TP Climate Progress
Language Intelligence: Lessons on persuasion from Jesus, Shakespeare, Lincoln, and Lady Gaga
The permafrost really scares me!
Nobody knows how much there is or how fast it will be released.
I just remember seeing a documentary where they were poking holes in the ice and with a match lighting 2- 8 foot fire balls.
I really feel like this will be the first dominoe in the long line of feedback loops.
Reading Obama’s address at Notre Dame gave me the chills. He said:
“Your class has come of age at a moment of great consequence for our nation and for the world – a rare inflection point in history where the size and scope of the challenges before us require that we remake our world to renew its promise; that we align our deepest values and commitments to the demands of a new age. It’s a privilege and a responsibility afforded to few generations – and a task that you’re now called to fulfill.”
Is this just a little reminiscent of a certain column in the NYTimes that named climateprogress the “Indispensible Blog”? (maybe he reads it! Hello, Mr. President!”
And then he said this:
“Your generation must decide how to save God’s creation from a changing climate that threatens to destroy it.”
I believe Obama totally gets it. As with the economy, he is doing what he can on climate, but his long term strategy is to position himself to be there to pick up the pieces when the “inflection” occurs.
I believe
The permafrost melting really scares the snot out of me, too.
Last estimate I saw of organic material in permafrost was 1.6 trillion tons.
If any significant fraction of that gets released as methane, coupled with the ice albedo effect from loss of the polar icecap, and with large scale releases of carbon from forests due to wildfires – this could be the end of all life on earth.
http://www.killerinourmidst.com
Which is why I favor carbon negative energy schemes:
From mongabay/biopact:
Obama gets it, as do Waxman and Markey. But maybe they don’t get the full picture.
If Obama really got it, he would nationalize the coal plants, ban the mining of coal, and convert the coal plants to carbon negative power plants. One embodiment of this idea would consist of biocarbon fuel, oxyfuel combustion with a HiPPS topping cycle, and deep injection of the resulting CO2.
I’m not a scientist, but after looking at that map, seeing that huge concentration of red over Siberia and taking note of the 4 to 5 degrees C above normal that this red represents….
I’d say the methane is already at work, has probably created its own feedback loop and will continue to work until it has been completely released.
In my humble opinion, this was the tipping point.
The concern over the release of methane is not limited to the permafrost. There is mounting evidence that sea bed methane releases are also affecting climate. http://tinyurl.com/qh225k So this is additional confirmation of what we know.
What I don’t get is the optimistic enthusiasm that Gail displayed over the idea that Obama gets it. At one level, he does and mouths the good words. At another level, he is a traditional big-business centrist Democrat, content with whittling away the edges with market based quasi solutions while making sure that mountain top removal continues, that coal mining does not suffer, that electric utilities get free credits on which to make a profit.
Wes Rolley CoChair, EcoAction Committee, Green Party US
I think (hope?) that Obama is a brilliant strategist. He knows what it is possible for him to do right now and he sticks to that, because he is building a reputation amongst most people of being trustworthy and unflappable.
When the “inflection” becomes obvious and threatens civil society – when there are shortages of water and food, and violent weather, floods and wildfires start hitting everywhere at once – the people will demand that government take drastic action. And Obama will be able to accomplish extraordinary things – like shut down the coal plants, and threaten other countries with reprisals if they don’t do the same – with full support of the citizens.
On the other hand, maybe Obama is in the pocket of ExxonMobil and the Rockefellers. He is, after all, associated with the Rockefeller financed Chicago School of economists.
Maybe he wants to go just fast enough to give Exxon its desire of an ice free Arctic that they can cruise around in drilling for oil, going after that 10 trillion dollars worth of oil thought to exist under the current polar icecap, not to mention the additional trillions of dollars worth of natural gas, and long term, economically potentially valuable methane hydrate deposits.
Council on Foreign Relations: Thawing Arctic’s Resource Race
http://www.cfr.org/publication/13978/thawing_arctics_resource_race.html?breadcrumb=%2Fregion%2Fpublication_list%3Fid%3D482#
“Whoops, sorry people, miscalculated just a little, and destroyed the biosphere. Sorry about that.”
Really, though, Obama is doing a lot. Gore is doing a lot. Waxman and Markey are doing a lot. But they’re encountering a huge amount of resistance, much of it traceable in my opinion to ExxonMobil and the Rockefeller family.
Of course, there are other huge traditional economic interests deluded enough to think that they can profit from what may very well be the end of everything that’s worth a damn.
I am neither hopeful nor impressed.
Too little, too late.
Big electric utilities are setting up to go nuclear. This would substitute one deadly contaminant for another and drain hundreds of billions from the US Treasury that are needed for truly economical responses to climate change. Watch the President’s Advisory Council and current legislative proposals for a Clean Energy Bank that will support dirty fuel.
Living on the edge of permafrost I have seen the trend during decades. If anything, the ice conditions in the Baltic Sea have been astounding. The Arctic is going to behave like the Baltic Sea I think, with now it´s one-year ice cover being dominant. I bet the Arctic one-year ice melts this summer and 2007 record will be hit year by year.
I’m reminded of Vonnegut:
“The good earth! We could have saved it, but we were too d*mned cheap and lazy.”
Best,
D
Little question in my mind we’re going to see another record Arctic Sea Ice loss this year. May is shaping up to be a record monthly rate of decline (in both area and extent), following on from a slow April due to unfavourable weather conditions. The Arctic SST anomaly is increasing daily
(1), while the entire area of the Arctic cap has fractured(2), much has been discharged from the Arctic Basin along the Eastern coast of Greenland(3) where it has rapidly melted in the the warm surface waters encroaching from the Atlantic.
(1) NOAA: Arctic SST Anomaly
(2) NASA: MODIS Arctic Mosiac
(3) Cryosphere Today: Arctic Sea Ice 30 day animation (requires Java)