Global temperature change
Open accessAbstract
Global surface temperature has increased approximately 0.2 degrees C per decade in the past 30 years, similar to the warming rate predicted in the 1980s in initial global climate model simulations with transient greenhouse gas changes. Warming is larger in the Western Equatorial Pacific than in the Eastern Equatorial Pacific over the past century, and we suggest that the increased West-East temperature gradient may have increased the likelihood of strong El Niños, such as those of 1983 and 1998. Comparison of measured sea surface temperatures in the Western Pacific with paleoclimate data suggests that this critical ocean region, and probably the planet as a whole, is approximately as warm now as at the Holocene maximum and within approximately 1 degrees C of the maximum temperature of the past million years. We conclude that global warming of more than approximately 1 degrees C, relative to 2000, will constitute "dangerous" climate change as judged from likely effects on sea level and extermination of species.
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The SST results for the open ocean are in good agreement with the literature.
“Although both higher and lower trends were detected by different authors for different time periods for the open ocean, our results are in good agreement with the literature (Table 2).(Good et al., 2006;Hansen et al., 2006;Signorini et al., 2015).”
From Recent Trends in SST, Chl‐<i>a</i>, Productivity and Wind Stress in Upwelling and Open Ocean Areas in the Upper Eastern North Atlantic Subtropical Gyre (2021) · cites this paper as Hansen et al., 2006
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- Authors
- Hansen, J., Sato, M., Ruedy, R., Lo, K., Lea, D. W., & Medina-Elizade, M.
- Affiliations
- Goddard Institute for Space Studies (US)
- University of California, Santa Barbara (US)
- Department of Earth Science, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106
- Venue
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
- Publisher
- National Academy of Sciences
- Published
- 2006-09-26
- Volume
- 103
- Issue
- 39
- Pages
- 14288-14293
- ISSN
- 0027-8424 (ISSN-L)
- 1091-6490
- PMC
- PMC1576294
- OpenAlex
- W1968178762
- Cited by
- 2,134
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 72 · 2025: 94 · 2024: 109 · 2023: 107 · 2022: 106 · 2021: 122 · 2020: 138 · 2019: 133 · 2018: 102 · 2017: 91 · 2016: 109 · 2015: 115 · 2014: 115 · 2013: 135 · 2012: 114
- FWCI
- 73.72
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Climate variability and models
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Atmospheric Science › Geology and Paleoclimatology Research
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Climate Change and Environmental Impact
- Keywords
- global warming, surface temperature trends, El Niño, western equatorial Pacific, eastern equatorial Pacific, sea surface temperature, paleoclimate, dangerous climate change, greenhouse gas emissions, sea level rise, species extinction
- MeSH terms
- Oceans and Seas, Seawater, Temperature, Time Factors, Greenhouse Effect
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