Month: March 2018

The Madden-Julian Oscillation: a weather system Wikipedia lists under Climate Change

by Robert W. Endlich

A significant weather system which affects the globe was not even discovered until the 1970s, perhaps because it is stronger in the Southern Hemisphere than the Northern. This system, the Madden-Julian Oscillation, is an area of enhanced rainfall with these characteristics:

The enhanced precipitation anomaly starts in the Indian Ocean; it always moves eastward, and usually moves from Indian Ocean into mid-Pacific at speeds of 9-19 Miles/Hour. In addition to the enhanced precipitation area itself, there is an associated area of suppressed precipitation, an out-of-phase area ahead of it, usually way out ahead of it. The disturbed weather areas usually last 30 to sometimes 90 days.

The convective precipitation signature of this system is strongest within 15 degrees north and south of the Equator. Continue reading “The Madden-Julian Oscillation: a weather system Wikipedia lists under Climate Change”

Climate F-Words

by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.

[Ed.  Dr. Roy Spencer wrote a post (22 March 2018) disagreeing with Lord Monckton’s theory that climate scientists have over-estimated feedback by a factor of 2, because they have been using the feedback  equations incorrectly.  Dr. Spencer agrees with the factor of 2 error, but he disagrees with the reason given by Lord Monckton.  In response, Lord Monckton has countered Dr. Spencer’s argument with a post of his own on Spencer’s blog.  The original Spencer post can be found here with Lord Monckton’s counter argument  here.]

A recent article by Lord Christopher Monckton over at WUWT argues that there has been an “elementary error of physics” that has led to climate sensitivity being overestimated by about a factor of 2.

I agree with the conclusion but not the reason why. It is already known from the work of Otto et ahttp://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/Trump-forcing-and-feedback-550x309.jpgl. (2013), Lewis & Curry (2015) and others that the climate system (including the deep oceans) has warmed by an amount that suggests a climate sensitivity only about half of what the models produce (AR5 models warm by an average of 3.4 deg. C in response to a doubling of CO2).

But the potential reasons why are many, and as far as I can tell not dependent upon Christopher’s arguments. For those who don’t know, Lord Monckton is a pretty talented mathematician. However, like others I have encountered over the years, I believe he errs in his assumptions about how the climate research community uses — and does or does not depend upon — the concept of feedback in climate modeling. Continue reading “Climate F-Words”