Recent hiatus caused by decadal shift in Indo-Pacific heating

Recent modeling studies have proposed different scenarios to explain the slowdown in surface temperature warming in the most recent decade. Some of these studies seem to support the idea of internal variability and/or rearrangement of heat between the surface and the ocean interior. Others suggest t...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science) 2015-07, Vol.349 (6247), p.532-535
Main Authors: Nieves, Veronica, Willis, Josh K., Patzert, William C.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Climate
Global warming
Greenhouse effect
Greenhouse gases
Ocean temperature
Ocean-atmosphere interaction
Oceans
Pacific Ocean
Radiative forcing
Solar energy
Southern Ocean
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Summary:Recent modeling studies have proposed different scenarios to explain the slowdown in surface temperature warming in the most recent decade. Some of these studies seem to support the idea of internal variability and/or rearrangement of heat between the surface and the ocean interior. Others suggest that radiative forcing might also play a role. Our examination of observational data over the past two decades shows some significant differences when compared to model results from reanalyses and provides the most definitive explanation of how the heat was redistributed. We find that cooling in the top 100-meter layer of the Pacific Ocean was mainly compensated for by warming in the 100- to 300-meter layer of the Indian and Pacific Oceans in the past decade since 2003.
ISSN:0036-8075
1095-9203
DOI:10.1126/science.aaa4521