El Niño will be blamed on human-caused global warming

White House 3rd National Climate Assessment Report: Forecasts increases in extreme weather events

Austin Texas, May 14, 2014 — NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center released its monthly ENSO report May 8th. It says transition to El Niño conditions will occur this summer.

The chances for a strong El Niño by summer were upped to 65 percent. That’s a higher probability which arrives earlier than NOAA forecast just a month ago. An equatorial ocean surface temperature increase to as much as +1.7°C above normal from October to December is predicted.

Past history indicates it’ll get stronger in the coming months.

Recent human history suggests that elevated global temperature this year and next brought on by El Niño will wrongly be blamed on CO₂-driven, human-caused global warming. Every weather fluctuation these days is blamed on it.

ENSO stands for El Niño/Southern Oscillation. It’s a natural phenomena that periodically occurs in the equatorial Pacific. It disrupts earth’s global climate system, producing both El Niño and La Niña events. Each has differing climate impacts depending on the time of year they arrive.

For the first time last month, ocean surface temperatures off western South America were at or above normal. Every El Niño is a blast of warm subsurface water driven eastward across the Pacific Ocean by large Kelvin waves. The crescendo is when they splash up against South America and destroy its fishing season.

Over the last month warm water from the tropical south seas, driven by a Kelvin wave, continued its inexorable journey eastward towards a final showdown with South America this fall and winter.

Warming has already begun showing up off Mexico’s Pacific coast and is drifting northward.

These atmospheric and oceanic conditions collectively indicate a continued evolution toward El Niño – NOAA Climate Prediction Center, 5/8/2014

NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center: El Niño intensified in April, moved eastward

What to expect in the United States this fall and winter

Ultimately, the extent and reach of El Niño into the United States depends on how warm the equatorial ocean gets and the length of time the event lasts.

Typically, the entire southern United States will see above normal precipitation all the way from the west coast to the east coast. From New Mexico to Florida temperatures are below normal.

There will be elevated fall and winter temperatures in New England, the Pacific Northwest and across southern Alaska from the panhandle to the tip of the Aleutian Islands.

The good news is it should help ease the droughts in California and Texas. The bad news is the south may see a damp, cool winter.

El Niño raises earth’s temperature

Australian Bureau of Meteorology: El Niño/La Niña events from 1876-Mar2013

El Niño warms. La Niña cools. The above graph shows that El Niño dominated the time period from 1978-1998. That’s when fully 0.5°C of the total 0.85° of earth’s temperature rise since 1880 happened.

La Niña has dominated since 1999 as earth’s temperature stabilized. The IPCC credits La Niña as one reason surface temperatures stopped rising after 1998.

This is not to say all temperature rise since 1978 is due to El Niño and that rising CO₂ had nothing to do with it. CO₂ has contributed. The question is how much warming is from it and how much comes from El Niño and other natural causes?

During 20 years from 1978 to 1998 the theory of human-caused climate change was in good agreement with observations. Since then that agreement has broke down. There should have been 0.4°C of temperature increase that has failed to materialize.

University of Washington: The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) matches earth’s temperature profile

Another natural cycle, just discovered in 1996, called the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) is yet another contributor to climate change that matches to earth’s measured temperature profile better than does CO₂.

PDO and La Nina are contributors earth’s “hiatus” from global warming so far this century.

Interestingly, both PDO and ENSO were discovered because they disturb ocean fisheries.

Conclusions

The coming El Niño of 2014-2015 will raise earth’s temperature, disrupt the climate system and cause 10s of billions of dollars in damages worldwide. It’s inevitable.

This year is shaping up to be like the El Niño of 1998-1999 which marked the end of the last global warming cycle. Earth’s temperature has remain elevated, but stable ever since. CBS reported the 1998 event caused damages estimated at $25 billion in the United States alone.

El Niño is a completely natural phenomena. It’s totally unrelated to either carbon dioxide or human activity.

It’s a safe bet, though, that Americans will be hit with a bewildering media blitzkrieg blaming it all on human CO₂ emissions and that we must reduce emissions right now to prevent further catastrophes. Don’t believe it.

El Niño has nothing to do with CO₂.

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