Data from Berkeley Earth that paints a very different story to the accepted climate change narrative

Data from Berkeley Earth that paints a very different story to the accepted climate change narrative

Highlights of this short article:

·       Analysis of Berkeley Earth data shows a significant difference in the rate of temperature increase between summer and winter in Greenland, with winter warming over four times more rapidly than summer.

·       Significant seasonal variation in the rate of warming is not specific to Greenland but is a global phenomenon at similar latitudes.

·       There is a correlation between warming rate and latitude, with a decreasing trend in warming rate as we move from north to south.

·       This analysis suggests that it is the change in orientation of the Earth to the sun, known as Milankovitch cycles, that is the primary driver of global warming.

·       These findings raise questions about the credibility of the existing climate change narrative.

Berkeley Earth offers comprehensive land surface temperature data for the entire planet. They calculate temperature anomalies by comparing the actual temperature to the average temperature during the period from 1950 to 1980. In a previous article ⁽¹⁾, I used data from this site to show that there was minimal evidence of a significant increase in global temperatures, contrasting it with the magnitude of seasonal variations. While it is undeniable that our planet is warming, what is the root cause? Could it be attributed to the orientation of the sun, considering it is the only heat source?

I had already downloaded data for some specific regions, and as this is available in monthly increments, it was a relatively simple task to interrogate the data to see if there were any seasonal variations in the rate of temperature increase.

To clarify, I am analysing the Berkeley Earth data from 1860 to 2020 by dividing it into three-month periods to calculate the average seasonal anomaly. For instance, Winter includes December to February, Spring includes March to May, and so on. I then graph this data and calculate the temperature change rate using a linear trend line. Comparing seasons each year is a dependable method because it allows us to draw conclusions based on the relative seasonal warming rates at specific locations. This approach reduces the risk of complications caused by factors like urban warming or thermometer inaccuracies.

I was expecting any seasonal differences to be minimal but to my surprise this was not the case. This is the analysis for Greenland for the period of high carbon dioxide emissions (Fig 1):

The chart clearly shows a significant difference in the rate of temperature increase between summer and winter (4.6 to 1). This difference intrigued me, prompting me to investigate if this pattern is consistent globally. Here is a map of the world (Fig 2) comparing the average annual warming rate (in black) with the seasonal variation (in purple) expressed as a percentage relative to the mean (relative standard deviation) for the four seasons. Higher values for both metrics indicate a more pronounced rate of warming and seasonal variation.

The key takeaways from the above (Fig 2) are as follows:

·       A clear decreasing trend as we move from north to south in terms of warming rate and a decreasing seasonal variation. This lack of seasonal variation was expected at the equatorial latitude but not for the northern and southern hemispheres.

·       Warming rates are consistent across latitudes that are at different ends of the earth.

(Data for Antarctica is only available from 1956 onwards so as this is not a comparable data set it has not been included)

To try and shed further light I have taken four cities / regions from the furthest north, furthest south and proximity to the equator and taken the mean seasonal warming rates for the locations represented by red, green, and orange dots respectively above (Fig 2).

This chart confirms that the difference between winter and summer seen in Greenland was not specific to this region but a global phenomenon at this latitude. In this analysis, using four locations, winter is warming nearly 4 (3.8) times more rapidly than summer. This seasonal trend is evident, albeit at a much less extent, at the equator and in the southern hemisphere.

If we examine the observation that the warming rate was changing with latitude using these twelve data sets, we get the following graph (Fig 4):

We can see that there is a reasonable degree of correlation between warming rate and latitude (R² = 0.7797; a value of 1.0000 equates to a perfect correlation). There are many other factors that influence local climate. Air and ocean currents have a strong bearing and can change on a seasonal basis, but the locations above span the globe.

To further examine this annual cycle of the rate of warming at different latitudes I have taken Greenland as the most extreme and plotted the monthly rate of rise and compared this with New York, the southern hemisphere (Southern Chile) and the equator (Singapore) (Fig 5):

There remains a significant correlation between the time of the year and the rate of warming. For Greenland the difference between the monthly maximum (January) and minimum (July) rate of warming is a factor of 6.5. This large difference indicates that the earth's change in orientation to the sun is playing a crucial role in the warming seen from 1860 to 2020. There is also a clear trend as we move from north to south in the maximum and variation of monthly warming. The 2^nd order polynomial curve fit has been determined using Excel.

Conclusions

This analysis suggests that global warming in the far northern hemisphere is highly seasonal, with Greenland exemplifying the most extreme winter-to-summer variations. Variances in warming rates across latitudes also point to the sun's proximity and angle as the primary driver of planetary warming during the period 1860 to 2020. These changes to the sun’s orientation to the earth are known as Milankovitch cycles ⁽²⁾. The changing seasons occur because the Earth orbits the sun in an elliptical path and is tilted on its axis. Greenland’s average seasonal range is approximately 26⁰C and as we are looking for something that can increase the warming rate by 0.011⁰C/year this simple explanation is hardly far-fetched.

I ponder the insights gained from this basic analysis and note that "climate scientists" admit their models fall short in explaining past rapid temperature shifts in Greenland ⁽³⁾, which were much more extreme than what we are currently experiencing. Professor William Happer co-wrote a paper ^{( 4)}, released but largely overlooked during the pandemic, that questions the concept of carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas at its current levels. These findings and many others prompt unanswered questions regarding the credibility of the existing climate change narrative.

References

(1)    Climate change - perspective is not a dirty word (Part 2)

https://open.substack.com/pub/sandrews/p/climate-change-perspective-is-not-c25?r=16e1vo&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

(2)    Cycles and Their Role in Earth’s Climate

Milankovitch (Orbital) Cycles and Their Role in Earth's Climate - NASA Science

(3)    2013: Dr. James White Ice Cores, Sea Level and Abrupt Climate Change

(view from 50 mins onwards)

(4)    Dependence of Earth’s Thermal Radiation on Five Most Abundant Greenhouse Gases W. A. van Wijngaarden and W. Happer

2006.03098 (arxiv.org)