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Friday, June 5, 2020

State of the Earth's Climate as of 2019







2019 was a warm year, 
but cooler than 2016.

2016 had been warmed 
by an El Nino heat release
from the Pacific Ocean.

Since satellite global 
average temperature
measurements began 
in 1979, the lower 
troposphere  ( where
the greenhouse effect
occurs ) temperatures 
have increased over 
both land and oceans.

Warming over land 
is much more than 
warming over oceans.

This could be caused 
by variations in 
cloud cover and/or
changes in  land use.

"Global" warming 
after 1980 has 
mainly been 
a Northern 
Hemisphere 
trend, with much
of the warming 
from 1994 to 1999. 

Antarctica
temperatures 
remained almost 
stable since the 
satellite record 
began in 1979. 



A stratosphere
(above troposphere)
temperature ‘pause’ 
has existed for about 
5 years.



Ocean Temperatures
at Different Depths:
  The Argo program 
has had 15 years 
of global coverage, 
growing from 
1,000 floats in 2004 
to more than 4,000 
floats in early 2020. 

Since 2004, when 
detailed recording of 
ocean temperatures 
began, the global 
oceans above a 
1900 meter depth 
have warmed slightly, 
on average. 




Sea level 
is monitored by 
satellite altimetry, 
and also direct 
measurements 
using tide gauges 
along coasts. 

Tide gauges suggest 
an average global 
sea-level rise 
of 1.0 to 1.5 mm/year, 
while satellite data 
suggest a rise of
about 3.2 mm/year, 
or more. 

The difference has 
no good explanation.

Neither of the two types 
of measurements indicate 
any modern acceleration 
in sea level rise. 



Since 1979, Arctic and 
Antarctic sea-ice extents 
have had opposite trends, 
decreasing and increasing, 
respectively. 



Northern Hemisphere 
snow cover extent 
has been stable
 since 1972. 



Tropical storms 
and hurricanes have had
large annual variations 
in accumulated 
cyclone energy (ACE) 
since 1970, but there 
has been no overall trend.

Also, no trend in U.S. 
for hurricane landfalls, 
since records began 
in 1851.



The annual change 
in tropospheric CO2 
has been increasing,
from about +1 part 
per million (ppm) 
per year in the 
early part of the 
record since1958
to more than 
2.5 ppm/year, 
towards the end 
of the record