2020 El Nino could start 18°C temperature rise

[ click on image to enlarge ]

Above image shows a blue long-term trend, based on NASA LOTI 1880-Oct.2019 data, 0.78°C adjusted to reflect ocean air temperatures (as opposed to sea surface temperatures), to reflect a higher polar anomaly (as opposed to leaving out ‘missing’ data) and to reflect a 1750 baseline (as opposed to a 1951-1980 baseline).

An international team of scientists are forecasting an El Niño for 2020. “The probability of ‘El Niño’ coming in 2020 is around 80%”, says Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, Director Emeritus of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.

Above image shows NOAA’s monthly global temperature anomaly from the 20th century average, colored by the El Niño – Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon.

A recent study found that El Niño‐Southern Oscillation (ENSO) variability over the last five decades is ~25% stronger than during the preindustrial.

As the NASA map below shows, heating in October 2019 was particularly pronounced over the Arctic Ocean.

Note that the above NASA map shows anomalies from a 1951-1980 baseline.

As the image below shows, just the existing carbon dioxide and methane, plus seafloor methane releases, would suffice to trigger the clouds feedback tipping point to be crossed that by itself could push up global temperatures by 8°C, within a few years.

As described in this post and in an earlier post, a rapid temperature rise could result from a combination of elements, including albedo changes, loss of sulfate cooling, and methane released from destabilizing hydrates contained in sediments at the seafloor of oceans.

[ from an earlier post ]

The situation is dire and calls for comprehensive and effective action, as described in the Climate Plan.

Links

• Early warning: Physicists from Giessen, Potsdam and Tel Aviv forecast “El Niño” for 2020 — PIK Research Portal
https://www.pik-potsdam.de/news/press-releases/early-warning-physicists-from-giessen-potsdam-and-tel-aviv-forecast-el-nino-for-2020

• Very early warning signal for El Niño in 2020 with a 4 in 5 likelihood, by Josef Ludescher et al.
https://arxiv.org/abs/1910.14642

• NOAA – Monthly temperature anomalies versus El Niño
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/201909/supplemental/page-3

• Enhanced El Niño‐Southern Oscillation variability in recent decades, by Pamela Grothe et al.
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2019GL083906

• NASA – GISS Surface Temperature Analysis (GISTEMP v4)