Emerging local warming signals in observational data
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Solomon_Emerging local.pdf
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Author(s)
Mahlstein, Irina
Hegerl, Gabriele
Solomon, Susan
Date Issued
November 2012
Journal
Geophysical Research Letters
Publisher
American Geophysical Union
Citation
Mahlstein, Irina, Gabriele Hegerl, and Susan Solomon. “Emerging Local Warming Signals in Observational Data.” Geophys. Res. Lett. 39, no. 21 (November 2012): L21711, p.1-5.
Version
Final published version
Abstract
The global average temperature of the Earth has increased, but year-to-year variability in local climates impedes the identification of clear changes in observations and human experience. For a signal to become obvious in data records or in a human lifetime it needs to be greater than the noise of variability and thereby lead to a significant shift in the distribution of temperature. We show that locations with the largest amount of warming may not display a clear shift in temperature distributions if the local variability is also large. Based on observational data only we demonstrate that large parts of the Earth have experienced a significant local shift towards warmer temperatures in the summer season, particularly at lower latitudes. We also show that these regions are similar to those that are found to be significant in standard detection methods, thus providing an approach to link locally significant changes more closely to impacts.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Chemistry
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences
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Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use.
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1029/2012gl053952
