"Expect global cooling for 2 – 3 decades": Easterbrook

Pacific Decadal Oscillation

You certainly woudn’t know about it from the mainstream media, but there is currently an International Climate Change Conference taking place in Chicago. But because it is full of climate realists, and you’re unlikely to get any decent armageddon stories, the MSM don’t even bother to show up, except to hurl ad hominems about Big Oil, yawn. At the conference, Geologist Don Easterbrook presented a paper that has warned of global cooling for a considerable period, Climate Depot reports. Many, including Easterbrook, believe that climate changes are far more closely linked to changes in the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) than to microscopic increases in a harmless trace gas:

The Pacific Ocean has two modes, a warm mode and cool mode, and regularly switches back and forth between modes in a 25-30 year repeating cycle known as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). When the PDO is in its warm mode, the climate warms and when it is in its cool mode the climate cools. Glacier fluctuations are driven by climatic changes, which are driven by ocean surface temperatures (PDO).

During the cool PDO mode, ocean surface temperatures in the eastern Pacific are cool. This was typical of the global cooling from 1945 to 1977. During the warm PDO, ocean surface temperatures in the eastern Pacific are warm. This was typical of the global warming from 1977 to 1998. The abrupt shift of the Pacific from the cool mode to the warm mode in a single year (1977) and the beginning of the last warm cycle has been termed the “Great Pacific Climate shift.” There is a direct correlation between PDO mode and global temperature

The ocean surface temperature in the eastern Pacific off the coast of North America was warm in 1997. In 1999, the PDO switched from its warm mode to its cool mode and has since remained cool as shown by satellite imagery. Adding the PDO record for the past decade to the PDO for the century provides an interesting pattern. The PDO 1915–1945 warm mode, the 1945-1977 cool mode, the 1977-1998 warn mode, and the switch from warm to cool mode in 1999 all match corresponding global climate changes and strongly suggest:

1. The PDO has a regular cyclic pattern with alternating warm and cool modes every 25-30 years

2. The PDO has accurately matched each global climate change over the past century and may be used as a predictive tool.

3. Since the switch of the PDO from warm to cool in 1999, global temperatures have not exceeded the 1998 high.

4. Each time the PDO has changed from one mode to another, it has stayed in that mode for 25-30 years; thus, since the switch of the PDO from warm to cool in 1999 has been entrenched, it will undoubtedly stay in its cool mode for another several decades.

5. With the PDO in cool mode for another several decades, we can expect another several decades of cooling. (source)

Even IPCC scientists acknowledge the effect of ocean oscillations on climate (when they’re not within hearing distance of Raj Pachauri, that is): see here.

Interestingly enough, this is also one of the points highlighted in Roy Spencer’s latest book, The Great Global Warming Blunder, in which he presents evidence for cloud cover responses to changes in the PDO, which result in warming and cooling of the climate. More on this in a future post.