“Turns out that this version particularly appeals, maybe because it doesn’t require much interpretation,” Hawkins said. The record-setting temperatures of 2016 have seen a small push from an exceptionally strong El Niño, but they are largely the result of the heat that has built up in the atmosphere over decades of unabated greenhouse gas emissions - as the spiral graphic makes clear. (Each agency that keeps such a temperature record handles the data slightly differently, which can lead to small differences in monthly and yearly values, though the overall trend is in broad agreement for all such agencies.) Just how much temperatures have risen is clear in the first few months of data from 2016, its line clearly separated from 2015 - which was the hottest year on record - and edging in on the 1.5 degrees C mark.Įvery month of 2016 so far has been the warmest such month on record in fact, the past 11 months have all set records, the longest such streak in the temperature data kept by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. He said that using an earlier baseline period would have better captured all the warming that has occurred, as there was some small amount already in the late 19th century. Michael Mann, a climate scientist at Penn State who created the famous “hockey stick” graph of global temperature records going back hundreds of years, said that the spiral graphic was “an interesting and worthwhile approach to representing the data graphically.” To support our nonprofit environmental journalism, please consider disabling your ad-blocker to allow ads on Grist. Climate spiral threatens land carbon stores Date: FebruSource: University of Reading Summary: The worlds forests are losing their ability to absorb carbon due to increasingly. An even more ambitious target of 1.5 degrees C (3 degrees F) has increasingly become a topic of discussion, and is also visible on the graphic. In the late 20th century, it is clear how much closer temperatures have come to the target the international community has set to keep warming within 2 degrees C (4 degrees F) above pre-industrial levels by the end of the 21st century. But clear warming trends are present in the early and late 20th century. Met Office and charts how each month compares to the average for the same period from 1850-1900, the same baselines used in the most recent report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.Īt first, the years vacillate inward and outward, showing that a clear warming signal had yet to emerge from the natural fluctuations that happen from year to year. The graphic displays monthly global temperature data from the U.K. Another climate scientist, Jan Fuglestvedt of the Center for International Climate and Environmental Research in Oslo, suggested the spiral presentation. The graphic is part of Hawkins’s effort to explore new ways to present global temperature data in a way that clearly telegraphs the warming trend.
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