Monthly Northern Hemisphere Land Temperature Anomaly

Temperatures have been rising fast in March 2023. The image below shows the Monthly Northern Hemisphere Land Temperature Anomaly up to March 2023, with two trends added. The blue trend, based on Jan.1850-Mar.2023 NOAA data, points at a 3°C rise in 2032. The magenta trend, based on Oct.2010-Mar.2023 NOAA data, better reflects variables such as El Niño and sunspots, and illustrates how they could trigger a rise of more than 5°C in 2026. Anomalies are versus 1901-2000 (not versus pre-industrial). 

Reducing emissions is the right thing to do, even though it comes with loss of the aerosol masking effect, a loss that causes a rise in temperatures, as discussed in an earlier post. Yet, despite pledges by politicians, greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere keep rising, as discussed earlier such as this in this post.

[ click on images to enlarge ]

Ocean heat

The sea surface temperature between 60°South and 60°North has been above 21°C for a while, something that hasn’t happened before in the NOAA record that started in 1981, as illustrated by the image below.

Vast amounts of ocean heat are moving toward the Arctic. With further melting of sea ice and thawing of permafrost, the Arctic Ocean can be expected to receive more heat over the next few years, i.e. more heat from direct sunlight, more heat from rivers, more heat from heatwaves and more ocean heat from the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean.

Last year, North Atlantic sea surface temperatures reached a record high of 24.9°C in early September. The continuing rise of ocean heat threatens to trigger massive loss of sea ice (and loss of albedo) and eruptions of methane from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean, as has been described many times before, such as in this post, in this post and in this post.

The above image illustrates the danger of two tipping points getting crossed, i.e. the Latent Heat Tipping Point and the Seafloor Methane Tipping Point.

Latent heat loss, feedback #14 on the Feedbacks page

[ see the Extinction page ]

This threatens to cause rapid destabilization of methane hydrates at the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean leading to explosive eruptions of methane, as its volume increases 160 to 180-fold when leaving the hydrates, as illustrated by the above image.

Conclusion

A huge temperature rise thus threatens to unfold over the next few years, as illustrated by the image in the right. Altogether, the rise from pre-industrial to 2026 could be more than 18.44°C, potentially as early as in 2026.

Meanwhile, humans are likely to go extinct with a rise of 3°C and most life on Earth will disappear with a 5°C rise, as illustrated by the image below, from an analysis discussed in an earlier post. 

This situation calls for urgent action. Reducing emissions alone won’t be enough. Carbon also needs to be removed from the atmosphere and oceans, through re-/afforestation, through pyrolysis of biowaste with the resulting biochar (and nutrients) returned to the soil and further methods. Even with a rapid transition to clean, renewable energy, with changes to food, land use, construction and waste management, and with removal of large amounts of carbon from the atmosphere and oceans, still more action is needed.

Marine Cloud Brightening is a good idea, while many further methods may first need more surplus clean energy to be available and/or require more R&D.

Whether action will happen successfully and rapidly enough is indeed a good question, but that question shouldn’t be used as an excuse to delay such action, since taking such action simply is the right thing to do. More is also discussed at Climate Emergency Declaration. 

Links

• NOAA – Monthly Northern Hemisphere Land Temperature Anomaly 
https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/monitoring/climate-at-a-glance/global/time-series/nhem/land/all/3/1850-2023

• Climate Reanalyzer – Daily sea surface temperatures
https://climatereanalyzer.org/clim/sst_daily

• Sea surface temperature at record high
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2023/03/sea-surface-temperature-at-record-high.html

• Dire situation gets even more dire

https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2023/02/dire-situation-gets-even-more-dire.html

• IPCC keeps downplaying the danger even as reality strikes
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2023/04/ipcc-keeps-downplaying-the-danger-even-as-reality-strikes.html

• NOAA – Climate Prediction Center – ENSO: Recent Evolution, Current Status and Predictions
https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf

• NOAA – Monthly Temperature Anomalies Versus El Niño
https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/monitoring/monthly-report/global/202303/supplemental/page-4

• Climate Emergency Declaration
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/climate-emergency-declaration.html