Surprise: 2 Recent Papers Show Sea Level Variability Have Little To Do With CO2

Sun rules sea level: Scientists discover unexpected relationship

By Dr. Sebastian Lüning and Prof. Fritz Vahrenholt
(German text translated by P Gosselin)

A group of researchers led by Adrian Martinez-Asensio have found an 11-year Schwabe solar cycle in the European sea level. The authors published their findings 19 November 2016 in the Geophysical Research Letters:

Decadal variability of European sea level extremes in relation to the solar activity
This study investigates the relationship between decadal changes in solar activity and sea level extremes along the European coasts and derived from tide gauge data. Autumn sea level extremes vary with the 11 year solar cycle at Venice as suggested by previous studies, but a similar link is also found at Trieste. In addition, a solar signal in winter sea level extremes is also found at Venice, Trieste, Marseille, Ceuta, Brest, and Newlyn. The influence of the solar cycle is also evident in the sea level extremes derived from a barotropic model with spatial patterns that are consistent with the correlations obtained at the tide gauges. This agreement indicates that the link to the solar cycle is through modulation of the atmospheric forcing. The only atmospheric regional pattern that showed variability at the 11 year period was the East Atlantic pattern.”

Already in May 2015 a group of researchers led by Daniel Howard found an influence by solar activity and ocean cycles on sea level trends in a paper  published in the Journal of Geophysical Research. The 2 factors  made up minimum 70% of the annual fluctuations. The paper’s abstract follows:

The solar and Southern Oscillation components in the satellite altimetry data
With satellite altimetry data accumulating over the past two decades, the mean sea level (MSL) can now be measured to unprecedented accuracy. We search for physical processes which can explain the sea level variations and find that at least 70% of the variance in the annually smoothed detrended altimetry data can be explained as the combined effect of both the solar forcing and the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO). The phase of the solar component can be used to derive the different steric and eustatic contributions. We find that the peak to peak radiative forcing associated with the solar cycle is 1.33 ± 0.34 W/m2, contributing a 4.4 ± 0.8 mm variation. The slow eustatic component (describing, for example, the cryosphere and large bodies of surface water) has a somewhat smaller peak to peak amplitude of 2.4 ± 0.6 mm. Its phase implies that warming the oceans increases the ocean water loss rate. Additional much smaller terms include a steric feedback term and a fast eustatic term. The ENSO contributes a peak to peak variation of 5.5 ± 0.8 mm, predominantly through a direct effect on the MSL and significantly less so indirectly through variations in the radiative forcing.”

 

27 responses to “Surprise: 2 Recent Papers Show Sea Level Variability Have Little To Do With CO2”

  1. Kenneth Richard

    No correlation between human emissions per year rate and sea level change…

    https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Sea-Level-Rise-Rates-1700-2017-CO2-Emissions.jpg

    In contrast, Total Solar Irradiance and sea level change….

    https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Sea-Level-Rise-Rates-TSI-Correlation1700-2013.jpg

    1. SebastianH

      You know what is funny? Skeptics using a graph by Jevrejeva from the year 2008, while the same author wrote this in 2009: http://kaares.ulapland.fi/home/hkunta/jmoore/pdfs/Jev2009GL040216.pdf (Anthropogenic forcing dominates sea level rise since 1850)

      Also the TSI reconstruction in the second graph doesn’t look like this in any publication I found from a quick search. They mostly look similar to this one: http://lasp.colorado.edu/home/sorce/files/2011/09/TIM_TSI_Reconstruction-1.png

      1. Kenneth Richard

        Yes, it is quite well known that Jevrejeva is a full-fledged warmist who believes we shall get catastrophic sea level rise by 2100 because of human CO2 emissions. Other scientists have recently concluded that no anthropogenic signal has been detected in sea level trends. Jevrejeva’s allegiance to the IPCC paradigm doesn’t change the fact that his reconstruction of global sea level rate changes via tide gauge evidence shows highly oscillatory behavior, wholly inconsistent with a linear increase in CO2 emissions. We even have rapid decelerations of sea level rise after the 1950s, which is again very inconsistent with models of anthropogenic forcing.

        And, of course, tide gauges today only show about 1.8 mm/yr of rise, or even less than that (1.04 mm/yr). This is a clear deceleration since the first half of the 20th century…

        Holgate, 2007The rate of sea level change was found to be larger in the early part of last century (2.03 ± 0.35 mm/yr 1904–1953), in comparison with the latter part (1.45 ± 0.34 mm/yr 1954–2003).”

        “Also the TSI reconstruction in the second graph doesn’t look like this in any publication”

        That’s probably because you only look for solar activity reconstructions that support your beliefs.

        https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Total-Solar-Irradiance-1700-2013-Yndestad-and-Solheim-2017.jpg
        Yndestad and Solheim, 2017 “Deterministic models based on the stationary periods confirm the results through a close relation to known long solar minima since 1000 A.D. and suggest a modern maximum period from 1940 to 2015. The model computes a new Dalton-type sunspot minimum from approximately 2025 to 2050 and a new Dalton-type period TSI minimum from approximately 2040 to 2065. … Periods with few sunspots are associated with low solar activity and cold climate periods. Periods with many sunspots are associated with high solar activity and warm climate periods.”

        Here are a few more for you to ignore…
        https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Soon-Connolly-2015-NH-Temps-and-TSI.jpg
        https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Modern-Grand-Maximum-Chen-2015.jpg
        https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Modern-Grand-Maximum-UVR-Chen-2015.jpg
        https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Cooling-Forecast-Solar-Steinhilber-and-Beer-2013.jpg
        https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Modern-Grand-Maximum-To-2100-Herrera-2015.jpg
        https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Modern-Grand-Maximum-Russell-2010.jpg

        1. yonason (from my cell phone)

          Chatbot-SebH must be a stranger to the concept of “hostile witness.”

  2. Curious George

    Sea level data are very noisy. If you carefully select a subset, you can find a correlation with any signal of your choice.

    1. Green Sand

      Listen carefully and you can hear it sloshing about

      1. yonason (from my cell phone)

        The chatbots’ brains?

        1. AndyG55

          Nope, that would be an EMPTY echo chamber, with walls that allow no rational thought in or out.

  3. SebastianH

    Both papers are about the variance in sea level rise and not the sea level rise itself: “Autumn sea level extremes vary” and “the variance in the annually smoothed detrended

    That’s the same as the correlation between sea surface temperatures and the change in the atmospheric CO2 content increase. The overall trend isn’t caused by the Sun as should be painfully obvious when looking at the instrumental record of TSI measurements.

    1. Kenneth Richard

      “The overall trend isn’t caused by the Sun”

      So if the Sun does not cause sea level rise or fall, what caused sea levels to rise at rates of about 5 meters per century (+50 mm/yr) during the Holocene, when CO2 levels weren’t rising? Why were sea levels 2 meters higher than now when CO2 concentrations were in the 260s ppm range? Was that the Sun? And if it was the Sun causing that, at what point did the Sun stop causing net sea level changes?

      1. SebastianH

        Here is another graph from Jevrejeva et al (2008): http://www.psmsl.org/products/reconstructions/figure1.gif

        If TSI were the cause for the recent sea level rise (see graph) then it would be visible in a graph of recent TSI measurements, wouldn’t it?

        1. Kenneth Richard

          Here is another graph from Jevrejeva et al (2008): http://www.psmsl.org/products/reconstructions/figure1.gif

          Wow, that graph correlates rather well with solar activity…
          https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Solar-Activity-8000-Years-Modern-Grand-Maximum-Usoskin-2017.jpg
          https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Solar-Activity-1600-2010-TSI-Blaauw-2017.jpg

          https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Soon-Connolly-2015-NH-Temps-and-TSI.jpg
          https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Modern-Grand-Maximum-Chen-2015.jpg
          https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Modern-Grand-Maximum-UVR-Chen-2015.jpg
          https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Cooling-Forecast-Solar-Steinhilber-and-Beer-2013.jpg
          https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Modern-Grand-Maximum-To-2100-Herrera-2015.jpg
          https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Modern-Grand-Maximum-Russell-2010.jpg
          https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Total-Solar-Irradiance-1700-2013-Yndestad-and-Solheim-2017.jpg

          Yndestad and Solheim, 2017 “Deterministic models based on the stationary periods confirm the results through a close relation to known long solar minima since 1000 A.D. and suggest a modern maximum period from 1940 to 2015. The model computes a new Dalton-type sunspot minimum from approximately 2025 to 2050 and a new Dalton-type period TSI minimum from approximately 2040 to 2065. … Periods with few sunspots are associated with low solar activity and cold climate periods. Periods with many sunspots are associated with high solar activity and warm climate periods.”

          1. SebastianH

            Only if you assume that sea level doesn’t rise at around 1360.5 W/m² TSI, and everything above that value causes thermal expansion.

            Is that the kind of correlation you see? Or is it just a basic linear one (ups and downs roughly matching)?

          2. Kenneth Richard

            “Only if you assume that sea level doesn’t rise at around 1360.5 W/m² TSI, and everything above that value causes thermal expansion.”

            The TSI trend rose from 1358 to 1362 between 1900 and 2000, with a deceleration between the 1950s and 1970s: https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Total-Solar-Irradiance-1700-2013-Yndestad-and-Solheim-2017.jpg

            The shape of this trend is similar to the trend in 0-20 meter global ocean heat content (blue trend): https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/World-Ocean-Heat-Content-0-20-m-and-0-400-m-Gouretski-2012.jpg

            Like solar activity and ocean heat content, a similar trend can be found for sea level rise rates from 1900 to 2000: https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Sea-Level-Rise-Rates-1700-2017.jpg

            Holgate, 2007
            The rate of sea level change was found to be larger in the early part of last century (2.03 ± 0.35 mm/yr 1904–1953), in comparison with the latter part (1.45 ± 0.34 mm/yr 1954–2003).”

            This SLR trend is also consistent with recorded regional patterns of sea level change. For example:

            https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Holocene-Cooling-Sea-Level-Tasmania-New-Zealand-Gehrels-12.jpg
            Gehrels et al., 2012Between 1900 and 1950 relative sea level rose at an average rate of 4.2±0.1 mm/yr. During the latter half of the 20th century the reconstructed rate of relative sea-level rise was 0.7±0.6 mm/yr. Our study is consistent with a similar pattern of relative sea-level change recently reconstructed for southern New Zealand.”

            https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Holocene-Cooling-Sea-Level-Japan-Sasaki-2017.jpg
            Sasaki et al., 2017
            “That the wind-induced sea level rise along the Japanese coast around 1950 is as large as the recent sea level rise highlights the importance of natural variability in understanding regional sea level change on interdecadal timescales.”

            On the other hand, there is no obvious correlation between sea level rise rates and CO2 emissions: https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Sea-Level-Rise-Rates-1700-2017-CO2-Emissions.jpg

          3. SebastianH

            On the other hand, there is no obvious correlation between sea level rise rates and CO2 emissions: https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Sea-Level-Rise-Rates-1700-2017-CO2-Emissions.jpg

            You don’t realize – again – what you are doing there, do you? I recognize that the other graphs look somewhat similar and linearly increasing time series usually do, but you can’t honestly compare a sea level rise rate to human CO2 emissions and declare that there is likely no connection by pointing out there is no “obvious correlation”.

            Human CO2 emissions cause an increase in atmospheric CO2 content, that increases forcing, which increases heat content which causes thermal expansion, which is a large part of the current sea level rise. The connection is pretty obvious, just like with acceleration toward speed towards distance … yet, acceleration doesn’t “correlate” with distance in an obvious way, does it?

          4. Kenneth Richard

            you can’t honestly compare a sea level rise rate to human CO2 emissions and declare that there is likely no connection by pointing out there is no “obvious correlation”.

            Well, yes I can do that.

            “Human CO2 emissions cause an increase in atmospheric CO2 content, that increases forcing, which increases heat content which causes thermal expansion, which is a large part of the current sea level rise. The connection is pretty obvious”

            Your beliefs about 0.000001 changes in the atmospheric CO2 concentration causing the heat content of the ocean to increase are not “pretty obvious”, especially since it hasn’t even ever been observed to occur in the real world (water temperature changing because CO2 concentrations are varied above it). It’s a model based on assumption. That’s all you have – beliefs that are not falsifiable.

          5. SebastianH

            Secondly, notice how quickly this discussion changed the topic again? The original comment was about both papers being about the variance of the sea level rise (which have “little to do with CO2”), not the rise of the sea level itself having “little to do with CO2”. Important difference.

          6. Kenneth Richard

            Explain why you believe sea levels rose at rates of 5 meters per century while CO2 concentrations didn’t change at all. What was the mechanism for that level of sea level change? Be specific.

            And then explain why sea levels were 2 meters higher than today as recently as 5,000 years ago. Why were the oceans so much warmer? Why was there so much more melted ice than today? What was the cause?

          7. SebastianH

            And last but not least (sorry for three replies in a row):
            http://lasp.colorado.edu/home/sorce/files/2011/09/TIM_TSI_Reconstruction-1.png

            Why does that reconstruction look so much different than this one?

          8. Kenneth Richard

            Because they’ve changed their minds. A few years ago, their reconstruction looked like this:

            https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/43/7a/ee/437aee4d473e9ee4a27374ba207ec6ff.jpg

            The link to that graph – http://lasp.colorado.edu/images/science/solar_infl/Surface-Temp-w-paleo.jpg – has now disappeared.

            Notice how closely that 1900-2000 TSI aligns with the ocean heat content record:

            https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Holocene-Cooling-Global-Oceans-0-20-m-Gouretski-12.jpg

          9. yonason (from my cell phone)

            Chatbot chatter…

            “Human CO2 emissions cause an increase in atmospheric CO2 content,”
            ____assumption shown by Murrey Salby and others to be at least in large part, if not completely wrong.

            “that increases forcing,”
            ____assumption that’s probably wrong, given that humidity yields a negative feedback.

            “which increases heat content”
            ____Depends on assumptions of CO2 causing warming, and positive forcing being true, which is a stretch for the first, and wrong for the second.

            ” which causes thermal expansion,”
            ____Not without a LOT of warming, for which negative forcing and an at best very weak contribution from CO2 are totally inadequate.

            “which is a large part of the current sea level rise.”
            ____Only in the warped uncritical imaginations of brainwashed chatbots.

            “The connection is pretty obvious,”
            ____Yes. The connection between garbage in to garbage out is well established.

            “just like with acceleration toward speed towards distance … yet, acceleration doesn’t “correlate” with distance in an obvious way, does it?”
            ____Unlike climate voodoo, kinematics is well established and quantitative.
            https://physics.info/kinematics-calculus/

            But your analogies clearly correlate with nonsense.

          10. yonason (from my cell phone)

            Poor SebH, Chatbot extraordinaire! Everything he (?) knows about climate is wrong.
            http://c3headlines.typepad.com/.a/6a010536b58035970c01b7c8bb7a00970b-pi

    2. AndyG55

      There is absolutely ZERO CO2 signal in any tide data, anywhere. FACT

      Yes, there is a “climate change” AGENDA signal in the satellite sea level data.

  4. Rog Tallbloke

    To understand the effect of solar variation on a large heat capacity mass like Earth’s oceans, you have to integrate the solar data to get a reasonable proxy for ocean heat content. If you look at empirical comparisons of average sunspot number during periods when the ocean temperature is steady, you can derive a value of approximately 40 sunspots per month. This also happens to be the average sunspot number over the period of record from 1749 to today. Integrating the sunspot numbers as a running total departing from this average produces a reasonable proxy for OHC.

    Calibrating the Steinhilber et al TSI reconstruction based on 10Be to the same baseline, we obtain a reconstruction which compares well to the Mann et al 2008 millennial temperature reconstruction.

    https://tallbloke.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/lgl-steinhilber-tsi-mann08-temp.png

    Adding in the detrended AMO and PDO oceanic oscillations and a CO2 value giving around 0.4C per doubling as per Richard Lindzen’s estimate, we obtain a curve which reproduces HADSSTv3 to an R^2 of 0.9 for monthly values since 1870.

    https://tallbloke.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/sst-model1.png

    The continuation of the model in blue in the lower panel is based on our planetary solar model plus a replication of the AMO from the C20th. It shows a moderate drop in global SST to 2050.

  5. The real cause of climate change over the last millennium | Tallbloke's Talkshop

    […] OK, this the last post before I go. This is a comment I made this morning over at Pierre Gosselin’s place. […]

  6. Ron Clutz

    Tallbloke, thanks for that analysis. It is consistent with a similar analysis by Dan Pangburn that I summarized in a post:

    https://rclutz.files.wordpress.com/2016/06/slide10.jpg

    Figure 10: 5-year running average of measured temperatures with calculated prior and future trends (Data Set 1) using 34 as the average daily sunspot number and with V1 SSN. R2 = 0.978887

    Projections until 2020 use the expected sunspot number trend for the remainder of solar cycle 24 as provided [6] by NASA. After 2020 the ‘limiting cases’ are either assuming sunspots like from 1924 to 1940 or for the case of no sunspots which is similar to the Maunder Minimum.

    https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2016/06/22/quantifying-natural-climate-change/

  7. Rog Tallbloke

    Hi Ron,
    Yes, Dan, myself and a couple of others all had independent lightbulb moments back in around 2007 when we realised integrating the solar data was the way to go. Doesn’t time fly when you’re having fun?

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