James Hansen et al.: Global Temperature in 2014 and 2015

Global Temperature in 2014 and 2015

16 January 2015
James Hansen^a, Makiko Sato^a,b, Reto Ruedy^c, Gavin A. Schmidt^b Kand Ken Lo^c

Abstract  

Global surface temperature in 2014 was +0.68 °C (~1.2 °F) warmer than the 1951-1980 base period in the GISTEMP analysis, making 2014 the warmest year in the period of instrumental data, but the difference from the prior warmest year (2010), less than 0.02 °C, is within uncertainty of measurement. The eastern two-thirds of the contiguous United States was persistently cool in 2014, cooler than the 1951-1980 average in all seasons.  Record warmth at a time of only marginal El Niño conditions confirms that there is no “hiatus” of global warming, only a moderate slowdown since 2000.  Global temperature in 2015 may further alter perceptions. We discuss the prospects for the 2015 global temperature in view of the seeming waning of the current weak El Niño.

Update of the GISS (Goddard Institute for Space Studies) global temperature analysis (GISTEMP)^1,2 (Fig. 1), finds 2014 to be the warmest year in the instrumental record.  (More detail is available athttp://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/ and http://www.columbia.edu/~mhs119/; Figures 2-7 here are available on the latter web site.) The three warmest years in the GISTEMP analysis, 2014, 2010, and 2005 in that order, can be considered to be in a statistical tie because of several sources of uncertainty, the largest source being incomplete spatial coverage of the data.  Similarly the next warmest years in our analysis, 1998, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009 and 2013, can be taken as a statistical tie for the 4th through the 10th in our analysis.  The 15 warmest years all occurred since 1998 (including 1998).  Year-to-year temperature fluctuations in Figure 1 are caused mainly by natural oscillations of tropical Pacific sea surface temperatures as summarized by the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO or Niño) index (lower part of Fig. 1), which we discuss further below.

Figure 1. Global surface temperatures relative to 1951-1980. ENSO index (12-month running mean) is based on sea surface temperature in Niño 3.4 area (5 N-5 S, 120-170  W) in tropical Pacific³ for 1951-1980 base period.  Green triangles mark volcanic eruptions producing an extensive stratospheric aerosol layer.

Figure 2. Temperature anomalies in the three warmest years and their monthly global anomalies.

Residents of the eastern two-thirds of the United States and Canada might be surprised that 2014 was the warmest year, as they happened to reside in an area with the largest negative temperature anomaly on the planet, except for a region in Antarctica, as shown by the map in the upper left of Figure 2.  The North American cold anomaly in 2014 contrasts with the other two warmest years, 2010 and 2005, when North America and almost all land areas had annual temperatures above the 1951-1980 climatology (Fig. 2).  The cold pattern in North America persisted through all four season in 2014 (Fig. 3).

Natural variability of regional temperature, even averaged over a 3-month season, is larger than the global warming that has occurred since the 1951-1980 base period (Fig. 1).  

Illustration of regional variability is provided by the average seasonal temperature anomaly for the contiguous 48 states of the United States (Fig. 4), whose area is about 1.5% of the global area.  The inter-annual variability is about twice as large in winter (Dec-Jan-Feb mean) as in summer (Jun-Jul-Aug).  Thus, even though winter warming is larger than summer warming, the chances of having a season colder than the 1951-1980 climatology are larger in winter than in summer.  For example, in the past 15 years (2000-2014), the mean summer anomaly in the U.S. is +0.69 °C and the winter anomaly is +0.78 °C, yet there are only two summers cooler than climatology, but four winters cooler than climatology.

Figure 3. Seasonal-mean temperature anomalies.  Dec-Jan-Feb map employs December 2013 data.

Figure 4. Seasonal-mean temperature anomalies for the contiguous 48 United States.

Decadal averages display the nature of global warming patterns clearly (Fig. 5).  Warming is larger over land than over ocean and greater at high latitudes than low latitudes, consistent with expectations for climate change driven primarily by increasing greenhouse gases⁴.  

Each of the past several complete decades has been notably warmer than the prior decade, but that remains to be seen for the current decade.

The rate of global warming has been less since 2000 than in the prior 30 years (Fig. 6).  

Whether there has been a significant change in the long-term warming rate must await additional data, but the apparent slowdown has led to numerous assertions that “global warming has stopped.”  Figure 6 confirms that there has been little increase of the 60-month (5-year) and 132-month (11-year) running means in the past decade, although it is not obvious that such a slowdown is outside the norm of unforced decadal variability.  Although there have been many suggestions for possible contributions to the slowdown of the recent warming rate⁵, a reduced warming rate of the Pacific sea surface temperature seems to be a significant factor.  Kosaka and Xie⁶ made global climate simulations in which they inserted specified observed Pacific Ocean temperatures; they found that the model simulated well the observed global warming slowdown or “hiatus,” although this experiment does not identify the cause of Pacific Ocean temperature trends.  England et al.⁷ suggest that the recent Pacific Ocean surface temperature anomalies are related to a strengthening of Pacific trade winds in the past two decades, and that warming is likely to accelerate as the trade wind anomaly abates.  In any event, we can anticipate that global warming will continue on decadal time scales, because Earth is out of energy balance – more energy coming in than going out – as a result of increased atmospheric greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide^4,8.

Figure 5. Decadal surface temperature anomalies relative to 1951-1980 base period.

Fig. 6. 12-month, 60-month and 132-month running means of global surface temperature.

Figure 6. 12-month, 60-month and 132-month running means of global surface temperature.

Global SSTs (blue line in Fig. 7) are now near the level reached at the peak of the 1998 “El Niño of the century.”  Land temperature (gold line) is now consistently 1.0 °C or more warmer than in 1951-1980.

It is of interest to know whether global warming will become more apparent in the near-term.  It is notable that the record global warmth of 2014 was achieved in a year in which the tropical Pacific Ocean surface temperatures were in a nearly ENSO (El Niño-Southern Oscillation) neutral or very weak El Niño state (Fig. 1).  There is a high correlation of global temperature with the Niño index, global temperature lagging the Niño index by a few months (Fig. 1).  Thus it is expected, as a consequence of the slightly elevated Niño index, that the 12-month running mean global temperature will continue to rise in the next few months to its highest level in the record, even if the recent weak El Niño continues to fade away.

Figure 7. Monthly and 12-month running means temperatures and Niño index.

Figure 8.  IRI/CPC Pacific Niño 3.4 SST Model Outlook (http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/MJO/enso.shtml#discussion).

Furthermore, it is possible that the ENSO warming trend that has occurred since the 2011 La Niña may not have run its course.  There could be a surge this coming Northern Hemisphere Spring, the season in which Nature tends to roll the El Niño dice³, to a strong El Niño.  Sea surface temperatures in the Western Pacific are well above climatology, and it has been argued⁹ that the warmth in the Western Pacific, along with the lack of an equivalent long-term warming trend in the Eastern Pacific, increases the chances of a “super El Niño,” comparable to the two strongest El Niños of the past century, which occurred in 1998 and 1983.  If 2015 is significantly warmer than 2014, there is clearly no hiatus.

So, what do dynamical ENSO models predict?  Two models, LDEO (Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory) and NCEP (National Center for Environmental Prediction), indeed predict a strong swing next spring to a strong El Niño (Fig. 8).  All the other models have the El Niño petering out.  We asked an ENSO expert, Mark Cane: “What is the physics behind the LDEO and NCEP forecasts that makes them so opposite to the other models?”  His response: “Good question.  The honest answer is that I don’t know, and neither does anyone else.  LDEO is an intermediate model of just the tropical Pacific, NCEP is a full coupled GCM.  There may be no salient differences in the physics of these versus the rest; it may have to do with the initialization schemes.  …If it is physics, my best guess is that the LDEO and NCEP models have a stronger thermocline feedback than the others.  It will be interesting to see how 2015 develops.”

Summary  

Record global temperature in 2014, achieved with little assistance from the tropical ENSO cycle, confirms continuing global warming.  More warming is expected in coming years and decades as a result of Earth’s large energy imbalance (more energy coming in than going out^d), and with the help of even a mild El Niño, 2015 may be significantly warmer than 2014.

Appendix

Table 1.  Rankings of annual global temperature in the GISTEMPS analysis.
2014      0.68 (0.675)        Statistical Tie 1-3
2010      0.66 (0.661)        Tie 1-3
2005      0.65 (0.651)        Tie 1-3
2007      0.62 (0.619)        Tie 4-10
1998      0.61 (0.607)        Tie 4-10
2002      0.60 (0.603)        Tie 4-10
2013      0.60 (0.596)        Tie 4-10
2009      0.59 (0.589)        Tie 4-10
2003      0.59 (0.589)        Tie 4-10
2006      0.59 (0.587)        Tie 4-10

Figure 9.  Expanded recent temperatures to clarify year-to-year changes.

---

References

[a] Earth Institute, Columbia University, New York, NY
[b] Goddard Institute for Space Studies, NASA, New York, NY
[c] Trinnovim LLC, New York, NY
[d] The measured planetary energy imbalance (0.6 W/m²) equals the amount of energy in exploding 400,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs per day, 365 days/year.  A better analogy (from Sarah Purkey and Greg Johnson): it is the amount of energy if every person on Earth runs 44 1,000-Watt hair dryers 24 hours/day, 365 days/year.
[1] Hansen, J., R. Ruedy, M. Sato, and K. Lo, 2010: Global surface temperature change. Rev. Geophys., 48, RG4004, doi:10.1029/2010RG000345.
[2] The current GISS analysis employs NOAA ERSST.v3b for sea surface temperature, GHCN.v3 for meteorological stations, and Antarctic research station data, as described in reference 1.
[3] Philander, S.G., Our Affair with El Niño: How We Transformed an Enchanting Peruvian Current into a Global Climate Hazard, Princeton Univ. Press, Princeton, NJ, 288 pp., 2006.
[4] Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis, Contribution of Working Group I to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, eds. T.F. Stocker, D. Qin, G.K. Plattner, M. Tignor, S.K. Allen, J. Borschung, A. Nauels, Y. Xia, V. Bex and P.M. Midgley, Cambridge Univ. Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, USA, 2013.
[5] Schmidt, G.A., D.T. Shindell, and K. Tsigaridis, 2014: Reconciling warming trends. Nature Geosci.,7, no. 3, 158-160, doi:10.1038/ngeo2105.
[6] Kosaka, Y., Xie, S.P., 2013: Recent global warming hiatus tied to equatorial Pacific surface cooling, Nature 501, 403-407, doi:10.1038/nature12534
[7] England, M.H., S. McGregor, P. Spence, G.A. Meehl, A. Timmermann, W. Cai, A.S. Gupta, M.J. McPhaden, A. Purich, A. Santoso, 2014: Recent intensificantion of wind-driven circulation in the Pacific and the ongoing warming hiatus, Nature Climate Change, publ. online 9 February 2014, doi:10.1038/NCLIMATE2016
[8] Hansen, J., M. Sato, P. Kharecha, and K. von Schuckmann, 2011: Earth’s energy imbalance and implications. Atmos. Chem. Phys., 11, 13421-13449, doi:10.5194/acp-11-13421-2011.
[9] Hansen, J., M. Sato, R. Ruedy, K. Lo, D.W. Lea, and M. Medina-Elizade, 2006: Global temperature change. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., 103, 14288-14293, doi:10.1073/pnas.0606291103.​

Time Magazine: A Bad Day for Climate Change Deniers … And the Planet

by Jeffrey Kluger, Time Magazine, January 16, 2015
Deeper, hotter, sicker—and the oceans are only part of it. Roc Canals Photography; Getty Images/Flickr Select

It’s not often that the climate change deniers get clobbered three times in just two days. But that’s what happened with the release of a trio of new studies that ought to serve as solid body blows to the fading but persistent fiction that human-mediated warming is somehow a hoax. Good news for the forces of reason, however, is bad news for the planet—especially the oceans.

The most straightforward of the three studies was a report from NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) confirming what a lot of people who sweltered through 2014 already suspected: the year is entering the record books as the hottest ever since reliable records started being kept in 1880—and the results weren’t even close. 

Average global surface temperature worldwide was 58.24 ºF (14.58 ºC)—surpassing previous records set in 2005 and 2007—and making 2014 a full 2 ºF (1.1 ºC) hotter than the average for the entire 20th century. And before you say 2 ºF doesn’t seem like much, think about whether you’d prefer to run a fever of 99 ºF or 101 ºF. The planet is every bit as sensitive to small variations as you are. 

“Today’s news is a clear and undeniable warning for all of us that we need to cut climate pollution and prepare for what’s coming,” said Lou Leonard, vice president for climate change at the World Wildlife Fund.

When it concerns the ocean, what’s coming may already be here. A sobering study in Nature looked at sea level rise in both the periods from 1901 to 1990 and from 1993 to 2010 in an attempt to sort out a seeming inconsistency: measurements from 622 tide gauges around the world showed that levels had risen 6 in. (15.24 cm) over the past century, but computer models and other tools put the figure at only 5 in. (12.7 cm). Here too, what seems like a little is actually a lot: a single inch of water spread around all of the planet’s oceans and seas represents two quadrillion gallons of water.

This could have meant good news, since it might have indicated that we’d overestimated the impact of melting glaciers and ice caps. But new computer modeling recalculated the degree of sea level rise over the last century and found that the tide gauges had it right all along, and the only thing that was wrong was that sea levels had risen more slowly than believed in the 90 years that followed 1900, and much faster in the 17 years from 1993 to 2010—close to three times as fast per year. What does that mean in the long term? Perhaps 3 ft. (0.9 m) greater increase by the end of this century if we keep on the way we’re going.

Finally, according to the journal Science, at the same sea levels are rising higher, marine life forms are growing sicker, with a “major extinction event” a very real possibility. All through the oceans, the signs of ecosystem breakdown are evident: the death of coral reefs, the collapse of fish stocks, the migration of species from waters that have grown too warm for them to the patches that remain cool enough.

What’s more, the increase in the number of massive container ships crossing the oceans has resulted in a growing number of collisions with whales—encounters in which the animals wind up the losers. Seafloor mining and bottom-trawling nets both plunder fish populations and further damage the environment in which deepwater species can live.

“Humans,” wrote the authors of the Science paper, “have already powerfully changed virtually all major marine ecosystems.”

No part of this bad-news trifecta is likely to change the minds of the rump faction of climate deniers—particularly in Washington. Texas Senator Ted Cruz, who is set to assume chairmanship of the committee that oversees science in general and NASA in particular had this to say to CNN about climate change: “The last 15 years, there has been no recorded warming. Contrary to all the theories that they are expounding, there should have been warming over the last 15 years. It hasn’t happened.”

He’s wrong on the facts—as the new temperature readings demonstrate—and wrong on his interpretation of the science which shows that the rate of atmospheric warming has indeed slowed a bit in the past decade and a half. The reason for that seeming happy development is not that climate change isn’t real, but that the oceans, for now, are sopping up more heat than anticipated—see, for example, those migrating fish.

Meantime, Cruz’s Oklahoma colleague Sen. James Inhofe is set to become chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. This is the same Inhofe who persists in his very vocal belief that climate change is “the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people” and that even if it is true, it might actually be good for the world.

Ultimately, reason will prevail; in the long arc of scientific history it usually does. How much ocean and atmosphere and wildlife we’ll have left when that happens, however, is another matter entirely.

Seth Borenstein, AP: Earth warms like a broken record; for 3rd time in 10 years, globe sets mark for hottest year

by Seth Borenstein, AP Science Writer, The Republic, January 16, 2015


FILE - In this July 25, 2014, file photo, a roofer works under the mid-day sun in Gilbert, Ariz. Federal science officials announced Friday that for the third time in a decade, the globe sizzled to the hottest year on record. Both the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA calculated that in 2014 the world had its hottest year in 135 years of record-keeping. Earlier, the Japanese weather agency and an independent group out of University of California Berkeley also measured 2014 as the hottest on record. (AP Photo, File)

WASHINGTON — For the third time in a decade, the globe sizzled to the hottest year on record, federal scientists announced Friday.

Both the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA calculated that in 2014 the world had its hottest year in 135 years of record-keeping. 

Earlier, the Japanese weather agency and an independent group out of University of California Berkeley also measured 2014 as the hottest on record.

NOAA said 2014 averaged 58.24 degrees Fahrenheit (14.58 degrees Celsius), 1.24 degrees (0.69 degrees Celsius) above the 20th-century average.

But NASA, which calculates temperatures slightly differently, put 2014's average temperature at 58.42 degrees Fahrenheit (14.68 degrees Celsius) which is 1.22 degrees (0.68 degrees Celsius) above the average of the years 1951-1980.

Earth broke NOAA records set in 2010 and 2005. The last time the Earth set an annual NOAA record for cold was in 1911.

NOAA also said last month was the hottest December on record. Six months in 2014 set marks for heat. The last time Earth set a monthly cold record was in December 1916.

"The globe is warmer now than it has been in the last 100 years and more likely in at least 5,000 years," said climate scientist Jennifer Francis of Rutgers University, who wasn't part of either research team. "Any wisps of doubt that human activities are at fault are now gone with the wind."

Texas A&M University climate scientist Andrew Dessler and other experts said the latest statistics should end claims by non-scientists that warming has stopped. It didn't, as climate denial sites still touted claims that the world has not warmed in 18 years.

2014's heat was driven by record warmth in the world's oceans that didn't just break old marks: It shattered them. Record warmth spread across far eastern Russia, the western part of the United States, interior South America, much of Europe, northern Africa and parts of Australia. One of the few cooler spots was in the central and eastern United States.

"Every continent had some aspect of record high temperatures" in 2014, said Tom Karl, director of NOAA's National Climatic Data Center.

Nine of the 10 hottest years in NOAA global records have occurred since 2000. The odds of this happening at random are about 1 in 650 million, according to University of South Carolina statistician John Grego. Two other statisticians confirmed his calculations.

Climate scientists say one of the most significant parts of 2014's record is that it happened during a year where there was no El Nino weather oscillation. During an El Nino, when a specific area of the central Pacific warms unusually and influences weather worldwide, global temperatures tend to spike. Previous records, especially in 1998, happened during El Nino years.

Every year in the 21st century has been in the top 20 warmest years on record, according to NOAA.

Temperatures have risen by about 1.6 degrees Fahrenheit (0.9 degrees Celsius) since the mid-19th century and pre-industrial times, said Gavin Schmidt, director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, where the space agency tracks warming temperatures.

"We are witnessing, before our eyes, the effect of human-caused climate change," said Pennsylvania State University professor Michael Mann.

Some non-scientists who deny man-made global warming have pointed to satellite temperature records — which only go back to 1979 — which show a warming world, but no record this year and less of a recent increase than the longer-term ground thermometers. 

But Mann, Dessler, Francis and others say there have been quality and trustworthy issues with some satellite measurements and they only show what's happening far above the ground. 

They said ground measurements are also more important because it is where we live.

University of Alabama Huntsville scientist John Christy, who measures temperature via satellite, puts 2014 in a cluster of warm years behind 2010 and 1998. He said he is "puzzled that this difference between surface and deep atmosphere continues to occur as it has now for 36 years. Our theories can't explain it. I don't know what is going on."

Georgia Tech professor Judith Curry, who is not in the mainstream of climate scientists, wrote that talk about the record implies that temperatures will get warmer, something she says won't happen for at least another decade. But she added in a blog post in response to the NOAA announcement: "I'm not willing to place much $$ on that bet, since I suspect Mother Nature will manage to surprise us."

NASA's Schmidt says temperatures will continue to rise with year-to-year variations and he wouldn't be surprised if 2015 breaks 2014's record: "The increase in greenhouse gases is unrelenting and that in the end is going to dominate most things going on."

This was the 38th year in a row that the world was warmer than the 20th century average, according to NOAA data. Most people in the world and the United States were born after 1976 and have never lived in a cooler than normal year.

"You want to understand what that (cooler) world is like and you wonder are you ever to going to experience that," said Victor Gensini, a 28-year-old meteorology professor at the College of DuPage in Illinois.

http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/d7375a310ef6475c9841accc756c4ba4/US--SCI--Hottest-Year

Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics

2014 was the hottest year on record, without assistance from El Niño


The sun rises in Pleasant Plains, Illinois. Photograph: Seth Perlman/AP

by Dana Nuccitelli, "Climate Consensus - The 97%," The Guardian, January 16, 2015

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NASA and NOAA have just reported that global surface temperatures in 2014 were the hottest on record. That also means 2014 was the likely hottest the Earth has been in millennia, and perhaps as much as 100,000 years.

But what’s really remarkable is that 2014 set this record without the aid of an El Niño event. El Niño events create conditions in which sea surface and hence global surface temperatures are anomalously hot. We call this part of the Earth’s “internal variability” because these events just temporarily shift heat around between the ocean surface and its depths. 

As this graphic shows (click here for an animated version), the last 5 record hot years of 2010, 2005, 1998, 1997, and 1995 were all assisted by El Niño events. 

NASA global surface temperature data (1966–2014) divided into La Niña years (blue), ENSO neutral years (black), and El Niño years (red), with linear trends displayed for each. Years influenced by major volcanic eruptions (orange) are excluded from the trend analysis. Created by Dana Nuccitelli. Photograph: Dana Nuccitelli

In contrast, 2014 had a slight cooling influence from La Niña-like conditions at the beginning of the year, a slight warming influence from El Niño-like conditions toward the end, and no net temperature influence from the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) for the year as a whole. 2014 was by far the hottest ENSO-neutral year on record, and the first year since 1990 to set a record without influence from El Niño.

1998, which saw the strongest El Niño on record, now falls to 5th-hottest year on record. The intense El Niño event made global surface temperatures in 1998 about 0.2 °C hotter than they would have otherwise been. Due to human-caused global warming, ENSO-neutral years are now hotter than even the most intense El Niño years a decade or two ago. As NASA GISS director Gavin Schmidt said,

This is the latest in a series of warm years, in a series of warm decades. While the ranking of individual years can be affected by chaotic weather patterns, the long-term trends are attributable to drivers of climate change that right now are dominated by human emissions of greenhouse gases

As the above graphic shows, over the past 50 years, there has been the same 0.15–0.16 °C per decade warming trend for La Niña years, for ENSO neutral years, and for El Niño years. So for example, an ENSO-neutral year today is about 0.25 °C hotter than a similar year would have been in 1998. That’s why 2014 was hotter than 1998 despite the big difference in El Niño temperature influences between the two years.

This is all happening during a time when we’re constantly being bombarded with inaccurate claims of a global warming “pause.” These mistaken claims stem from the fact that the rate of global surface warming has slowed a bit over the past 15 years, in large part because we’ve seen more La Niña events and fewer El Niño events during that time, and also due to heightened volcanic activity.

In fact, at any point over the past 5 decades we can find a period during which global surface warming “paused.” Yet each such period was hotter than the last. That’s because each is just a temporary effect caused by a period with a predominance of La Niña events and other short-term cooling temperature influences. As this figure shows (click here for an animated version), underneath the short-term noise, human-caused global warming continues unabated.

NASA global surface temperature data for 1970–2014. Trends in blue are shown for the periods Jan 1970–Oct 1977, Apr 1977–Dec 1986, Apr 1987–Oct 1996, Aug 1997–Dec 2002, Jan 2003–Jun 2012, and Jul 2012–Feb 2014. Created by Dana Nuccitelli Photograph: Dana Nuccitelli

Following the global surface temperature records set in 2005 and 2010, a new record in 2014 is right on schedule. A 2011 paper by Stefan Rahmstorf and Dim Coumou found that as global warming continues, we should expect to set new records about once every 4 years.

Indeed, if we only use the data of the past 30 y, these show an almost linear trend of 0.017 °C/y, yielding an expected 2.5 new record hot temperatures in the last decade [1 per 4 years].

Given that we may see an El Niño event in early 2015, there’s also a chance that this record could be short lived, and 2015 might break it once again.

On top of the record global surface temperatures, we also saw a record amount of heat accumulating on Earth, mainly in the oceans. According to NOAA, in 2014 the oceans accumulated an amount of heat equivalent to about 200 million atomic bomb detonations (13 zettajoules, or 13 billion trillion Joules). That’s about 6 to 7 atomic bomb detonations per second, on average, throughout 2014. That’s a lot of heat, likewise reaching record levels.

Climate Nexus summarizes some other notable climate facts from 2014 in this video.

In short, global warming continues unabated, and claims of a “pause” are misguided. Because of human-caused global warming, average years today are hotter than El Niño years just a decade ago, and the Earth continues to accumulate immense amounts of heat. Despite short-term noise, that long-term trend will continue until we cut our carbon pollution and curb global warming.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2015/jan/16/global-warming-made-2014-record-hot-year

Michael E. Mann: 2014 Was Earth’s Warmest Year on Record

by Dr. Michael E. Mann, facebook, January 16, 2015

Three major climate organizations (JMA, NASA, and NOAA) have now released their official estimates for the 2014 Global Mean Surface Temperature. Both JMA and NOAA conclude that 2014 was substantially higher, i.e., outside the margin of error, of previous contenders (1998, 2005, and 2010) while NASA finds 2014 to be warmest, but within the margin of error of 2005 and 2010 (i.e., a “statistical tie”).

Based on the collective reports, it is therefore fair to declare 2014 the warmest year on record. This is significant for a number of reasons. Unlike past record years, 2014 broke the record without the "assist" of a large El Niño event. There was only the weakest semblance of an El Niño, and tropical Pacific warmth contributed only moderately to the record 2014 global temperatures. Viewed in context, the record temperatures underscore the undeniable fact that we are witnessing, before our eyes, the effects of human-caused climate change. It is exceptionally unlikely that we would be seeing a record year, during a record warm decade, during a multidecadal period of warmth that appears to be unrivaled over at least the past millennium, were it not for the rising levels of planet-warming gases produced by fossil-fuel burning.

The record temperatures *should* put to rest the absurd notion of a “pause" (what I refer to as the “Faux Pause” in Scientific American: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/earth-will-cross-the-climate-danger-threshold-by-2036/) in global warming. There is a solid body of research now showing that any apparent slow-down of warming during the past decade was likely due to natural short-term factors (like small changes in solar output and volcanic activity) and internal fluctuations related to, for example, the El Nino phenomenon. The record 2014 temperatures underscore the fact that global warming and associated climate changes continue unabated as we continue to raise the concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

NOAA and NASA: 2014 was Earth’s warmest year on record (since 1880)

December 2014 record warm; Global oceans also record warm for 2014

 

The globally averaged temperature over land and ocean surfaces for 2014 was the highest among all years since record keeping began in 1880, according to NOAA scientists. The December combined global land and ocean average surface temperature was also the highest on record.

 

This summary from NOAA's National Climatic Data Center is part of the suite of climate services NOAA provides to government, business, academia and the public to support informed decision-making.

 

In an independent analysis of the data also released today, NASA scientists also found 2014 to be the warmest on record.

 

2014

• During 2014, the average temperature across global land and ocean surfaces was 1.24 °F (0.69 °C) above the 20th century average. This was the highest among all years in the 1880–2014 record, surpassing the previous records of 2005 and 2010 by 0.07 °F (0.04 °C).
• Record warmth was spread around the world, including Far East Russia into western Alaska, the western United States, parts of interior South America, most of Europe stretching into northern Africa, parts of eastern and western coastal Australia, much of the northeastern Pacific around the Gulf of Alaska, the central to western equatorial Pacific, large swaths of northwestern and southeastern Atlantic, most of the Norwegian Sea, and parts of the central to southern Indian Ocean.
• During 2014, the globally-averaged, land-surface temperature was 1.80 °F (1.00 °C) above the 20th-century average. This was the fourth highest among all years in the 1880–2014 record.
• During 2014, the globally-averaged, sea-surface temperature was 1.03 °F (0.57 °C) above the 20th-century average. This was the highest among all years in the 1880–2014 record, surpassing the previous records of 1998 and 2003 by 0.09 °F (0.05 °C).
• Looking above Earth’s surface at certain layers of the atmosphere, two different analyses examined NOAA satellite-based data records for the lower and middle troposphere and the lower stratosphere.
• The 2014 temperature for the lower troposphere (roughly the lowest 5 miles of the atmosphere) was 3rd highest in the 1979–2014 record, at 0.50 °F (0.28 °C) above the 1981–2010 average, as analyzed by the University of Alabama–Huntsville (UAH), and 6th highest on record, at 0.29 °F (0.16 °C) above the 1981–2010 average, as analyzed by Remote Sensing Systems (RSS).
• The 2014 temperature for the mid-troposphere (roughly 2–6 miles above the surface) was 3rd highest in the 1979–2014 record, at 0.32 °F (0.18 °C) above the 1981–2010 average, as analyzed by UAH, and 6th highest on record, at 0.25 °F (0.14 °C) above the 1981–2010 average, as analyzed by RSS.
• The temperature for the lower stratosphere (roughly 10–13 miles above the surface) was 13th lowest in the 1979–2014 record, at 0.56 °F (0.31 °C) below the 1981–2010 average, as analyzed by UAH, and also 13th lowest on record, at 0.41 °F (0.23 °C) below the 1981–2010 average, as analyzed by RSS.  The stratospheric temperature is decreasing on average, while the lower and middle troposphere temperatures are increasing on average, consistent with expectations in a greenhouse-warmed world.

·       According to data from NOAA analyzed by the Rutgers Global Snow Lab, the average annual Northern Hemisphere snow cover extent during 2014 was 24.95 million square miles, and near the middle of the historical record. The first half of 2014 saw generally below-normal snow-cover extent, with above-average coverage later in the year.

 

·       Recent polar sea ice extent trends continued in 2014. The average annual sea-ice extent in the Arctic was 10.99 million square miles, the 6th smallest annual value of the 36-year period of record. The annual Antarctic sea-ice extent was record large for the second consecutive year, at 13.08 million square miles.

 

December 2014

• During December, the average temperature across global land and ocean surfaces was 1.39 °F (0.77 °C) above the 20th century average. This was the highest for December in the 1880–2014 record, surpassing the previous record of 2006 by 0.04 °F (0.02 °C).  
• During December, the globally-averaged, land-surface temperature was 2.45 °F (1.36 °C) above the 20th-century average. This was the 3rd highest for December in the 1880–2014 record.  
• During December, the globally-averaged, sea-surface temperature was 0.99 °F (0.55 °C) above the 20th-century average. This was also the 3rd highest for December in the 1880–2014 record. 
• The average Arctic sea-ice extent for December was 210,000 square miles (4.1%) below the 1981–2010 average. This was the 9th smallest December extent since records began in 1979, according to analysis by the National Snow and Ice Data Center based on data from NOAA and NASA.
• Antarctic sea ice during December was 430,000 square miles (9.9%) above the 1981–2010 average. This was the 4th largest December Antarctic sea-ice extent on record.
• According to data from NOAA analyzed by the Rutgers Global Snow Lab, the Northern Hemisphere snow-cover extent during December was 130,000 square miles below the 1981–2010 average. This was the 20th smallest December Northern Hemisphere snow-cover extent in the 49-year period of record.

A more complete summary of climate conditions and events can be found at: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2014/13