Russ Steele
This is not the kind of story one usually finds on NPR, except if you continue to read all the way to the bottom there is the usual sop to continued global warming. I have written about Argo and the floating buoys before, but there were claims of problems with the data analysis. The buoys dive 3,000 feet down and measure ocean temperature pop up and send the data by satellite, and start the process all over again. Since 2003 Argos has not recorded any warming of the global oceans.
Some 3,000 scientific robots that are plying the ocean have sent home a puzzling message. These diving instruments suggest that the oceans have not warmed up at all over the past four or five years. That could mean global warming has taken a breather. Or it could mean scientists aren't quite understanding what their robots are telling them.
On the other hand, the folks at ICECAP suggest that the problem might be that the lower atmosphere has cooled over the same period. Here is a plot of the satellite measured temperatures.
Full NPR story here.
My guess, is that Argos will be soon seeing additional drops in
temperature. What do you think, will the oceans be cooling? It is
interesting that I have seen similar cooling that starting around 2003
in the Sierra. Here is plot of some Sierra temperatures from the
Northern Sierra Air Quality Management District.
