Is Global Warming a Northern Hemisphere thing?

An illustration in the IPCC report "Summary for Policymakers" based on the fourth Assessment Report "Climate Change 2007" shows a very interesting pattern.

(I'll need to print the page and scan it in - sorry for the delay.)

Refer to page 4 where there is a diagram of the world showing changes in surface temperatures from 1970 to 2004. There is a clear gradient in the degree of temperature change from the Arctic region with up to +3.5o C (increase) to -1o C (DECREASE!) in areas close to the Antarctic in the southern hemisphere.

Why is this? (If you know, please post a comment.)

It is also interesting that over 90% of the "Observed Data Series" for both physical and biological systems are for the Northern Hemisphere.

So, what about these options?

• There is greater land mass in the northern hemisphere. But doesn't the land heat and cool faster than the sea?
• There have been more temperature readings taken in the northern hemisphere and the southern hemisphere temperature data isn't as complete.
• There is a change in the position of the northern hemisphere relative to the southern hemisphere in relation to the sun in the long term cycle of the Earth's orbit.
• There is more industry in the northern hemisphere and temperature change is localised to a greater extent than global.
• Changes in the Earth's magnetic field has caused some particles (which absorb heat such as water vapour) to concentrate more in areas north of the Equator.
• The scientists obtained temperature increase readings in the northern hemisphere more easily than in the southern hemisphere, so they have concentrated on studying those areas.
• There are more politicians in the northern hemisphere (sorry - I couldn't resist that one!)
• The readings which didn't support the Global Warming theory were filtered out.

Interesting, but the illustration covers only a 34 year period. I did enough science at school to know that climatic trends span much greater time periods than that.

Also, the report talks about "average" surface temperature change. If more readings are taken in the northern hemisphere land masses close to cities, then doesn't that make the "average" data skew towards those areas, and not give a picture of the globe overall? That's what I had thought they meant by "average" temperature change up until I saw this illustration. Now I need to find out what data points they used for this average, and how many readings were taken from each.

Concern - Average means average of the data received, not average in global coverage.

Another noteworthy point is that very few of the "Observed Data Readings" are in countries which the United Nation's Millenium Development Goals aim to assist. Hmmmm - that could be worthy of a blog post all on it's own!

Interesting, but not conclusive. I'll keep reading................

IPCC says global warming is not a certainty!

Have you ever read an IPCC report?

Having become increasingly curious and concerned about the direction governments are heading in the name of saving the planet from this thing called Global Warming, or Climate Change, I decided to do my own research. After reading a number of assorted items I found by searching Google, I decided I was ready to tackle the big one - IPCC.

First, let's tackle the acronym. IPCC stands for Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Their website is at http://www.ipcc.ch/

On their website they have a number of reports dating back to 1990.

The IPCC is a scientific body which was set up by the WMO and UNEP in 1988. More acronyms! WMO is Wolrd Meteorological Organisation and UNEP is the United Nations Environment Programme. On their About IPCC page they describes themselves as:

The IPCC is a scientific intergovernmental body set up by the World
Meteorological Organization (WMO) and by the United Nations Environment
Programme (UNEP). Its constituency is made of :

• The governments: the IPCC is open to all member countries of WMO and UNEP. Governments of [member countries] participate in plenary Sessions of the IPCC where main decisions about the IPCC work programme are taken and reports are accepted, adopted and approved. They also participate [in] the review of IPCC Reports.
• The scientists: hundreds of scientists all over the world contribute to the
  work of the IPCC as authors, contributors and reviewers.
• The people: as [an] United Nations body, the IPCC work aims at the promotion of the United Nations human development goals

So, this seems to be a very credible organisation. Pity the third dot point says they speak for "the people", and not that they consult them.

It is their work that lead to the Kyoto Protocol and the UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change). See why they use acronyms?

The IPCC has several classifications of publications:

• Assessment Reports
• Special Reports
• Technical Papers
• Methodology Reports
• Supporting material

IPCC has produced four Assessment Reports - 1990, 1995, 2001 and 2007. The Assessment Reports have a number of parts or volumes. I found one of these, the Synthesis Report, which has a sub-report called "Summary for Policymakers" or SPM. Aha! This sounded like a good place to start. I downloaded the Summary for Policymakers for 2007 and 2001 last night.

Talk about good bed time reading!

I had a quick overview of the headings and diagrams, and glanced through some of the text. I will progressively study some the IPCC documents and post some observations and questions as I go. Be patient, it will take me a while!

Glancing through the 2007 Summary for Policymakers, some words caught my attention - "likely", "very likely", "high confidence", "very high confidence", "medium confidence" and "more likely than not"!

Having studied a little bit of statistics, and having worked in bureaucracy, I noted that the use of these words is significant. The words caught my attention because I don't recall the reports I have read and heard in the popular media using them.

IPCC says that global warming is not a certainty!

Talk about an "Aha!" moment!

They have my attention now. More reading and more blogging to come............