Earth Changes Gallery

Return To Gallery Home

Climate Oscillations
 (AKA El Nino, La Nina, Southern Oscillation, Glacial,  Interglacial, etc.)

Abstract  |  Major Findings  |  Table of Contents  |  Introduction  |  Background


Ocean Climate Cycles ENSO-Wobble Correlations  |  Bingo! Frequency Chart   

Orbital Climate Cycles:   18 Yrs - 2000 Yrs   12,500 Yrs  100,000 Yrs  |  400,000 Yrs   |  2 MillionTectonic Eras

Trends & Lobbies In The Great  Global Warming Debate


Earth Changes Bulletin:   SUBSCRIBE  |  UNSUBSCRIBE   |||   Update  |  Archive  |  Almanac

Earth Systems Monitor  

Gallery ~~~

Cosmos & Planets  |  Climate  |  Earth's Wobble  |  Earthquakes  |  Humanity  |  Solar Activity  |  Tectonics  |  Volcanism
 

 

Climate Oscillations
 

Abstract:  [5-3-2007] This is the Earth Changes Storyboard for links to information about Earth's climate oscillations and the factors which create them.  The climate cycles range from short term oscillations of a few years to cycles which are vastly longer than 10,000 or even 100,000 years.  The primary objective of this storyboard is to summarize the basic facts about  these cycles and how they combine to produce Earth's constantly changing climate regime.  The perspective which is created by observing the interactions of these cycles leads easily to the realization that Global Warming is almost entirely a creation of the combined activity of Earth's tectonic dynamics  and peaks in  Solar Activity which are induced by the astrophysical relationships between the Sun and the planets.   From this perspective it can be seen quite easily that the current round of Global Warming is probably induced by tectonic dynamics which are over-riding a  solar- induced cooling trend.   If so, human activities, except for densely settled areas and regions with human-damaged ecologies, likely have very little influence on global climate trends and neither does the carbon dioxide gas which human activities are generating.

 

One major focus in the Climate Storyboard are the graphs composed by MWM  which correlate the Nino/Nina weather oscillation with the spiraling motions of Earth's Seven Year Wobble Cycle.  Directly connected to this focus are many other graphs which provide comparative perspectives about how the El Nino or ENSO phenomenon is correlated to trends in world volcanism, the warming of the World Ocean, earthquakes, "Global Warming", and the eruptive behaviors of specific groups of volcanoes.  Collectively, this material demonstrates the principles of Vortex Tectonics and explains how El Nino and other short term oceanic climate fluctuations  reflect tectonic events which are produced by the Earth's shifting wobble.  In the simplest possible terms, as the Earth's wobble fluctuates in size through its seven year cycle, heat flux increases and decreases  rhythmically  through the Great Rifts (so-called mid-oceanic ridges) which split the centers of the world's oceans.  This heat fluctuation alternatively causes El Nino and La Nina, and most likely the other oceanic climate oscillations.

 

A second major focus of the storyboard is to provide a collection of graphs which document the many other long-term cycles which shape the climate regime on Earth. These range from the 11 year Solar Activity (Sunspot) Cycle (actually 8 to 13 years) up to the 100,000 and 400,000 year cycles in Earth's orbit which produce major changes in the average temperature of the Earth and the weather extremes of the Seasons.  The material is provided to demonstrate that the primary driver of long term cyclical changes in Earth's climate for any given latitude are variations in Earth's orbital cycles.

 

The third major focus of the storyboard is to combine the correlations between the short and long term cycles to argue that the current round of Global Warming is caused, like El Nino and other oceanic climate oscillations, by dynamic changes in the  location of the Earth's wobbling Spin Axis. The location of the Wobble commenced a long term cumulative drift during the past 90 years which is forcing a long term shift in the shape of the Earth.  This shape-shifting appears to be driving a long term acceleration in earthquake and volcanic activity which is producing an overall increase of heat flow into the oceans.  This increased heat flow produces the symptoms which humans have come to call "Global Warming".  Apparently, as the fossilized records of the past appear to make clear, all three factors, Solar, Orbital, and Axial, combine periodically and somewhat chaotically to  produce both long, slow changes and relatively rapid, radical changes in Earth's climate regimes.   The fossilized records demonstrate that sharp shifts of average annual temperature up to as much as 10 Celcius, can occur in as little as a few hundred years and perhaps occasionally under special circumstance in as little as 20 years.  More probable than not, tectonic shape-shifting and changes in latitudes brought about by changes in the location of Earth's wobbling Spin Axis, easily explain the most radical climate changes which appear in the fossil records.  Earth's shape-shifting activity occasionally accelerates to produce much higher heat flow into the oceans in periodicities which may last from a few decades to a few millennia.   In longer periodicities, ranging from  several millennia to perhaps 20,000 years, the orientation of the surface of the Earth to the Sun appears to shift occasionally in "discrete events" which are both rapid and fairly radical in the degree of shift.  There are many different kinds of evidence for such shifts, which which have been estimated by different scientists to be as small as a fraction of a degree up to as much as 30 degrees.

 


Climate Oscillations

Table Of Contents

 

Note:  The storyboard is under continuous development and expansion.  A few links here are not working very well at the moment, and more may be added at any time.

 

 

Sunmary Of Major Findings Developed Uniquely Through This Study By MWM

 

 

Introduction To The Climate Storyboard

 

 

Background Information - Links to concepts, references, and major sources

1.  for El Nino & La Nina, SO (Southern Oscillation). & other oceanic cycles
 

2.  for orbital cycles
 

3.  for wobble cycles

 

El Nino - Wobble Correlation Graphs

1.  El Nino & The Wobble X Plot 1890-2006
        expanded version    giant version

landscape line graph in three different sizes by MWM

 

2.  El Nino & The Wobble Y Plot 1890-2006
landscape giant-sized horizontal line graph by MWM
 

3.  El Nino & The 7 Year  Wobble Cycle 1962-2005

portrait area and bar graph by MWM

 

4.  La Nina & The 7 Year  Wobble Cycle 1962-2005

portrait area and bar graph by MWM

 

Correlations Between Oceanic Climate Oscillations, Tectonic Activity
& Other Geophysical Trends:

El Nino Bingo Chart:  Frequency Of Extreme Events Began Accelerating In 1960

portrait bar graph by NOAA Staff Scientists


Trend of Increase In Hurricane Activity 1950-2007

area plot in portrait orientation by

 

Trend of Increase In The Frequency Of The Wobble 1973-2004
scatter plot in portrait orientation by

 

Trend of Increase In The Drift Of The Wobble 1900-2006
scatter plot in portrait orientation by MWM


Earthquakes - Trend Of Increase in World Seismic Activity 1973-2007
area plot in landscape orientation by MWM

 

Volcanism; Trend of Increase In World Volcanic Activity 1973-2004
area plot in landscape orientation by MWM

 

Trend of Warming In The World Ocean 1973-2004
line plot in portrait orientation by Sydney Levitus et al

Nine Trends Which Are Changing The Earth
Global Warming line and area plots in expanded landscape orientation by MWM

Correlations Of El Nino With Selected Volcanoes
line, area, and bar plots in landscape orientation by MWM

Orbital & Long Term Climate Cycles From 18 Years To Millions Of Years
 

 

 


Climate Oscillations

Summary of Major Findings

 

El Nino

 

La Nina

 

 

 

 

Climate Oscillations

Introduction

 

 

The Global Warming issue, which has become as much an interesting study in social pandemics as it is an interesting body of information about the Earth, has stimulated a large and growing number of research studies in all the of Earth Sciences and in many astrophysical endeavors during the past 25 years.  When looking at the current scientific literature, it seems like scarcely a rock, ocean-bottom, cosmic cycle, or layer of ice has not been looked under for clues to the whereabouts of the Global Warming Cause.  

 

Immeasurably more is now known about the Earth as a result of all this new research.  The rapidly growing sophistication in global reporting, database archiving, and scientific communication makes possible the communication of new findings at unprecedented rates.  The result is an explosion of new ideas, relationships in data, and the emergence of  new paradigms which are coalescing disparate information into some detailed understandings of the history and change of the Earth's climate and tectonic activity during the past couple of million years.  Scientists can now describe, with reasonable proof, the annual snowfall in Northern Greenland a million years ago, the approximate swing in temperature for the year, and whether any major volcanic eruptions occurred in any given span of time during the the last hundred thousand years or so.

 

The explosion of scientific inquiry has clearly identified at least a dozen major cycles in the Earth's climate patterns.   Many other minor cycles also have been identified and there does not yet seem to be a count of how many distinguishable cycles there may  be. 

 

Though it might have once seemed merely obvious, science can now demonstrate in very precise terms that the Sun, both metaphorically and literally, is the center of the climate change cycles on Earth and most probably on the other planets as well. 

 

Cyclical changes in Solar Activity, which appear to range from a few weeks to a few hundred years,  and the changing shape and size of the orbit of the Earth, which occurs through tens of thousands of years,  combine to profoundly affect Earth's climate.  The largest shifts in the orbital climate cycles can now be traced backwards in time for the past two million years or so while the Solar Activity cycles can be traced backwards accurately for several thousand years, even to some extent for the past 400,000 years.

 

These cycles are easily traced by using "proxy" chemicals (such as Carbon 14, Oxygen 18, Sulfur Dioxide, Nitrate,  etc.) which are found in tree rings, ice layers, sedimentary deposits on the ocean floor, or  in other ways.  The "proxies" indicate the amount of average sunlight on the Earth's surface for any given period of time.  As the amount of sunlight and ionic energy which reaches the Earth's surface varies through time,  changes occur in the size of annual tree rings and in the quantity of proxies (isotopic chemical compositions) which are deposited in layers of mud and ice and other types of sedimentation.  These changes  can now be directly correlated with the amount of sunlight, which is primarily  determined by the shape and size of the orbit of the Earth.

 

The orbital cycles of many planets in our solar system combine through time to also directly influence the activity of the Sun.  This can give rise to many variations in Solar Activity, ranging from short term (from 10.5 years to 400 years) to very long term, even apparently causing variations which persist for millions of years. 

 

Based on these variations, scientists are now able to reconstruct the levels of activity in the Sun hundreds, thousands, perhaps even millions of years ago though at this writing no one apparently taken the million year leap.  This "reconstructed" Sun of the past can be combined with the cycles in Earth's  orbit around the Sun to decode what the "proxies" tell us was the climate on Earth for any given decade or so for the area from which the proxies were extracted.  Many cycles have been identified by these means and they indicated that most of the long term shifts of climate are largely driven by Earth's orbit.

 

There are some major barriers to how far back science can go.  Eventually, the records become too scanty and the limits of mathematics produce increasingly poor results.  Elaborate mathematical modeling of the planetary orbits has demonstrated that the mathematics which are used for the orbits of the planets eventually produce chaotic alterations in the planet's orbits.  F. Varadi et al, for instance, have demonstrated that the orbits of the inner planets substantially deviate from their current orbital cycles in about four million years.  They call this the gradual onset of chaos, vis a vis present conditions.  Varadi et al also found that chaos overtakes the orbits of the primary "heavy planets, the so-callled outer planets of Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, and Uranus  after about 25 milion years.  These onsets of chaos are probably less "real" in the solar system and probably more produced by the current limits of mathematical modeling.

 

These mathematical demonstrations are profoundly important to the study of climate cycles and in fact to all Earth Sciences. 

 

Scientists can now detect a multiplicity of climate cycles which are produced by combinations of orbital and solar cycles

 

 

 

 

 

Although the cause and effect processes which generate changes in Solar Activity (such as Sunspots, magnetic storms, CME's flairs, etc.) are still poorly understood, it is easy to see that relationships between the orbital cycles of the planets directly influence the size and length of the cycles of Solar Activity.  For instance, ancient civilizations were aware that when Mercury's orbit aligned with Venus and the Earth is certain ways, generally many changes would occur in the weather and in human societies.  For this reason the ancients called Mercury "the messenger of the gods".  Its fleeting appearance in the evening sky was thought to be a signal of changes about to come.    Scientists now know that when the orbital position of Mercury aligns with Venus and/or with Earth to make them parallel to the Sun in a straight line, a major surge in Solar Activity often occurs, except when the Sun is quiescent in its MIN phase every 11 years, as it was during 2007.  

 

The surge in Solar Activity brought by the combinations of the planets  includes Sunspots and many types of magnetic and ionic storms which persist for a few days or even weeks.  These directly impact the Earth's magnetic field, the atmosphere, and weather patterns, causing a wide variety of changes on the Earth, including the intensification of hurricanes and tornadoes.

 

The level of average Solar Activity surges up and down in many cycles, ranging from peaks of a few days produced every few weeks by Mercury's  or Venus's alignments with the other planets, to  an 11 year Sunspot Cycle, or even to periods of 20-22, 44, 100, or 200 years, and perhaps even longer.

 

Many specific rhythms of Sunspot Activity which reflect the orbits of specific planets also have been mathematically detected.    The Magnetic Reversal Cycle of 20-22 years is almost certainly related directly to the "beat" of the orbits of Saturn and Jupiter which brings their positions in a straight line "alignment" with the Sun every 20 years.  The longer Solar Activity cycles may reflect various other synchronicities in the orbits of the planets.  Some mathematical studies have been made which appear to demonstrate that this is almost certainly true.

 

Accordingly, it most likely follows that the Sun is occasionally capable, under certain synchronicities in the orbits of the planets, of such greater peak output than has been recorded by scientists since the 1600.  These synchronicities may be both short and long term, thus they have the potential to produce a year of profound impact during certain years or even many long periods of alteration in the the general climate. 

 

For the most part, annual weather patterns and multi-year climate cycles  are connected to the waxing and waning of solar activity in its 11 - 200 year cycles, and possibly even a 1ooo year cycle.  Beginning in the early Twentieth Century, historians also have directly correlated the 11 year Solar Activity cycle with various agricultural cycles, human economic cycles, the outbreak of major wars, and other forms of human mass behavior.

 

Many perplexing questions are being created by the growing knowledge of cycles of change in the Earth.  If we compare climate data with past levels of Solar Activity for the past 400 years, it is very clear that cool and warm periods are most likely directly connected to changes in the general level of Solar Activity.   In other words, the cooler the average temperature, the lower is the Sunspot Count, and vice verse, of course.

 

If we compare our present trends with the trend lines of the past, it would seem that Solar Activity is now trending downward and should continue to trend downward during Century 21.  Thus "Global Cooling" should be the inevitable result during the next 50 years.  This of course contradicts the Global Warming that we can see in fact is actually happening.  Thus it is apparent that something else besides just Solar Activity is driving our current trend of Global Warming. 

 

This makes the profound question of the moment:  what is this "something else"? 

A burgeoning archive of new knowledge has been generated by scientists seeking to answer this question.   This mountain of new knowledge has been used during the past 15 years to slowly improve computer modeling activities which attempt to make deductions which describe and predict how the Earth's climate system works and what will happen in the future.  Scientists test what will happen in CO2 increases, or if temperature increases, or if solar activity increases, etc.   Most scientists hope to be able to use computers to tell us that Global Warming is real and what effects it will produce in the future.

 

It would appear, however, that these models, despite Al Gore's charming rap on climate change and the models which are predicting doom from CO2, are still widely regarded with great suspicion by most scientists.  As they say in the computer trade, garbage in, garbage out.  As of early 2007, the computer models have  not gotten any prediction right...in advance.  The best they have been able to do is "simulate" predictions by performing correctly in hindsight

 

After some 20 years of trying, the problem of the computer models comes down to this: they cannot currently be distinguished from mathematical solipsism (fantasy).  If the output is still garbage, the input must still be too mistaken or too limited to produce useful results, or simply processed with the wrong ideas.

 

Fortunately the vast computerized Ozian climate models are un-necessary.  The simple truth is that about half of what we need to know about trends of changing climate patterns can be read right out of the charts of long range orbital cycles.  The other half will come from more systemic monitoring of the dynamic changes in the oceans, which rule the climate patterns and oscillations, and the Great Rift of the Earth which releases heat into the bottoms of the oceans.  In other words, the modeling does not need to be fancier with cleverer thoughts.  More of the right kind of real-world empirical research is essential.

 

It is the release of heat from the Earth which provides the energy which creates the oscillations in the temperatures of the ocean basins and thence the surfaces of the continents.  From this comes the regular ocean climate oscillations such as El Nino.  From this also comes a portion of the trends of Global Warming and Global Cooling which can be seen in the historical past. 

 

Just how much of the climate warming and cooling trends should be proportioned between the tectonic activity in the oceans, the Solar Activity Cycles, and Earth's orbital cycles,  is as yet unknown.  The mathematicians have been so busy on CO2, they have completely missed the upward trend in volcanic activity and the warming of the World Ocean.  Despite our over-all historical ignorance. One thing can be easily established for the current round of Global Warming.  It is not much driven by Solar Activity nor Earth's orbit, it is primarily a tectonic event.

 

El Nino, the premier ocean climate cycle,  is perhaps the best place to see how this works and look for ways to proportion the causes and effects.  A few  short term climate cycles are becoming well known under names like  El Nino, La Nina, Southern Oscillation (Southern Hemisphere for New Zealand and Australia), Arctic Oscillation, North Atlantic Oscillation (which may be the same thing), the Hurricane Cycle, etc.  These names all refer to weather patterns which involve large regions of the Earth.  The center of each weather pattern is a major section of the ocean.  Hence, these are appropriately called Ocean Climate Cycles. 

 

Under each of them is a vast, large, highly active belt of volcanic activity which generates heat surges in the range of terawatts.  

 

The essence of these ocean climate cycles is ultra simple.  Regions of the World Ocean alternate between periods of high or low pressure gradients which are produced by surface temperatures which are cooler or warmer than average. These cycles are seasonal of course, but there are also multi-year cycles of periods warmer or cooler than normal.  One of the longest ocean climate cycles, the Northern Atlantic Cycle, appears to be some 20 years in length.  But this may be surpassed by a Hurricane Cycle of xxx in length and a super El Nino Cycle of 50 years or more in length.

, though the Hurricane cycle is a 20 year cycle

 

More climate cycles are being identified related to regions smaller than oceanic basins the size of the North Atlantic.  Generally these are also related to the oceans, most especially to the monsoon air flows which the oceans produce. As one would expect, these all tend to be interconnected with the major oscillations, such as El Nino. 

 

More or less, whatever in the world's climate cycles is not directly created by the Sun, is created by the oceans.   By far, the most important, the largest driver of short term climate cycles is the El Nino syndrome.  Technically known as the ENSO (El Nino Southern Oscillation), these cycles are typically a few years (3-7) in length.

 

Only slightly  longer in length are the Solar Activity Cycles, which typically are 8-13 years, averaging at about 10.5 years.  The Solar Cycles interact with the Ocean Climate Cycles in complex ways, creating never-ending variations in the weather. The variations are so complex that the human species still does not know how to think about these combinations nor talk about them consistently.

 

Does the Sun produce El Nino? Not a chance, as the charts below do reveal.  But the Sun does clearly influence some of the El Nino pattern, most likely by influencing the energy which is in the atmosphere.  As the ocean surface temperature alternates between warm and cool, the Solar Activity cycle pumps the atmosphere into greater or lesser activity. For instance, a more active atmosphere will take off more of the warm El Nino water, producing a stronger El Nino year. 

 

Since all of these ocean climate and solar activity cycles are of different lengths, they combine endlessly in different ways.  The result is never a dull average moment on the Earth.   All changes, ceaselessly, and thus each El Nino Oscillation and each Solar Activity Cycle are somewhat unique.

 

dblecheck hurricane cycle length

get terminology descriptors consistent with this below

Beyond the short term Ocean Oscillation Cycles (which we can think of as ranging predominately from 3 to 21 years in length) and the Solar Activity Cycles (which we can think of as ranging predominately between 8 to 400 years in length), we encounter a variety of orbital cycles, most of which are vastly longer in duration.  The Orbital Cycles range from the relatively short term seven year cycle in the size of Earth's Wobble and  the Lunar Eclipse Cycle of 18.5 years, which is generally known as the Saros Cycle, to the 100,000 and 400,000 cycles in the shape, size, and angle of the Earth's obit about the Sun's equator.  

 

Nearly all of the historical climate data from the distant past reflect these orbital cycles.  Why?  Primarily because of variations in the light received on Earth at any given latitude.  The light varies directly with changes in Earth's orbital relationships with the Sun, the Moon, and the twisting, bobbing, wobbling changes in the orientation and location of the Spin Axis of the Earth.

 

These cycles are well defined and their reflections can be be easily seen in a variety of ways in the quantities of isotopes and chemical ions which are deposited in polar ice, ocean and lake sediments, tree rings, peat bogs and other materials from the ancient past.  Scientists have learned how to use measurements of  isotopes such as Oxygen-18 and Carbon-14 in various layers as "proxies" for defining changes in the warming and cooling trends of the climate.  Carbon-14, for instance, can define the amount of light, the general trends in the Solar Activity Cycle, and the likely temperature changes through tens of thousands of years into the past.   Oxygen-18 can track these trends backwards for millions of years.  As these chemicals increase and decrease through vertical profiles of mud or ice, scientists can directly infer whether the amount of light hitting the surface of the Earth was increasing or decreasing during any given time.

 

As can be seen in the record of the rocks, ice, and sediments of Earth,  variations in the sizes and connections between the orbital cycles produce significant climate change phenomenon on a regular cyclical basis.  Cycles of 18, 12,500 or 12,750, 40,000, , 25,500, 100000,  and 400000 years have been defined during the past 20 years through a large number of studies, most especially the ice core studies on Antarctica conducted under Petrie. cite xxx please

 

A great number of these cycles can be directly correlated with three aspects of Earth's orbit:  the size of the orbit, the shape, and the inclination of the orbit relative to the equatorial plane of the Sun (which is the same as the "average equator" of the entire Solar System) .  Technically these aspects  are described by astrophysicists as:

 

 

Eccentricity (distortion of the shape of Earth's Orbit): 

The amount of this distortion is called the eccentricity of the Earth's orbit and it is measured as a unit of ellipsicity which indicates the amount of variation from a perfect circle.  The eccentricity of the Earth's orbit varies between nearly 0 (a perfect circle to almost 0.05 over a period of 41,000 years.  Currently it is 0.0167 and it is very slowly getting smaller. 

 

The more eccentric, the greater is the amount of variation in heat which is given to the Earth between Perihelion (closest approach to the Sun) and Apogee (furthest distance from the Sun). Since the overall total area of the orbit remains the same, the amount of solar energy striking the Earth does not change.  What changes is the concentration of the energy into periods of warming and cooling. By itself, this cycle would do very little to change Earth's overall climate.  The impact comes when this cycle is combined with other orbital cycles.

 

Axial Tilt (also known as Obliquity)

The Spin Axis of the Earth is signifcantly tilted relative to the equatorial plane of the Earth.  Varies....variation is becoming smalll

This tilt of course produces nearly all the annual variations in our Weather.  Obviously changes in teh amount of tilt will have a definite influcence on the climate in the temperate and arctic zones, though of course this chnage will unnoticable in the equatorial zones.

 

This tilt s

 

 major cooling and warming eras.......

 

as much warming as...

what is most interesting about these cycles is that CO2 appears to increase, AFTER the warming.

 

sudden shifts appear in the ice record

in as little as 20 years.  radical shifts,

 

These three are said to create what are called "the ice ages". 

 

 

What makes the current climate change so extremely challenging to decipher is that

there is no orbital factor, with the singular exception of the 18 year lunar cycle, which can produce any sudden climate shifts and nothing close to the amount of climate change we have seen in the past 100 years.

 

We are currently in the middle of a middling range of orbital cycles. No extremes, not much change during the last 1000 years and none to be expected during the next 1000 years.  Thus,  orbitally speaking, no trends here.  Whatever is currently happening has no relationship to orbital factors and orbital graphs.

 

But, historically speaking, we have a profound mystery of substantial change which "looks like" some of the orbitally-induced climate shifts of the far past.  Is it climate change induced by a very long Solar Activity Cycle, such one which is perhaps in the range of 1000 to 5000 years long?  Or is it some unknown geophysical cycle?  Or is this just a random fluctuation in the vast infinity of the cosmos?

 

Without any ability to find causal agents for our current climate change in the Earth's orbital cycles and other long-term cosmic factors, we left to our own devices in the current age.  Within this framework, the story of Global Warming is best begun with the story of El Nino.  El Nino is in its essence a "brief" period of warming of a major portion of the world.  The climate and weather patterns which El Nino produces are essentially the same as what world-wide "Global Warming" is now beginning to create more and more on a permanent basis. 

 

The major difference between the El Nino Climate Regime and the Global Warming Climate Regime is the scale and duration.  Essentially both El Nino and Global Warming add energy into the atmosphere and "push" the climate of any given latitude further into a higher latitude.  For El Nino, that is for a season or a year at most.  For Global Warming, the push is permanent.  El Nino impacts about 50% of the Earth for several months in duration, Global Warming is affecting the entire Earth more or less permanently shifting the seasons into new patterns or what we can call new "Syndromes". 

Since the effects are so similar, it is perfectly rational to ask if the causes might be the same.   Is the warming trend in the Pacific Equator which produces El Nino caused by the same source which is warming the North Atlantic and the Arctic, where the main symptoms of "Global Warming" are the most pronounced? In fact, it is perfectly dense not to ask such a fundamental scientific question, even though this observation will in today's political environment make some people with their own pet theories very upset.  Such is the nature of really basic science.

It occurred to me only in the last two years to ask this question.  I have known for some ten years now, from certain correlations I made in natural phenomenon, that El Nino is not an "effect" produced by the atmosphere from solar energy, it is primarily a release of volcanic heat along the Pacific Equator from the bottoms of the oceans.  Once you surmise this connection it is easy to observe.  The fundamental observations are presented in the six El Nino - Wobble graphs which follow.  As I watched the Earth's tectonic activity accelerate on its now fifty year old trend line, it finally dawned on me that this "Global Warming" phenomenon might be simply more of the same type of heat flowing from underwater volcanism through other portions of the Great Rift (which are generally called mid-oceanic ridges).

It was the Arctic Ocean which really tipped me off.  It is in the Arctic zone that we can see most clearly that the Earth is warming up.  Here is where "Global Warming" is most definitely a proven fact as a 30 year or so trend despite a trend of decrease in Solar Activity during the same period of time.  How could the Arctic ice pack melt unless the water underneath it was warming up? If one thinks through the physics of the issue, it is practically impossible to conclude that a small one or two  degree increase in the average atmospheric temperature, which is occuring in spite of a 3o year decline in average Solar Activity, can produce a 20% increase in the annual summer melting of the Arctic.  It is so cold there that a one or two degree difference in the air is impossibly far from the required heat shift which can produce a melt of the ice.  How is that heat getting there to melt the ice on a sustained basis at a greater rate each year?  Since you definitely cannot assign that to the "weather",  the only possible cause MUST BE IN THE WATER.  Or, rather, more correctly, under the water.  

And rather more precisely, underwater volcanism from the Great and deep Rift which cuts directly through the center of the Arctic and which has provided scientists with signatures in the water of volcanic plumes through over half of its expanse. edit xxx citation required

Well, this gets quite ahead of the story,  in fact far beyond this Storyboard about the Wobble and the El Nino and the Earth's Climate Oscillations.  It should and will take quite a bit to prove those assertions and this is not the place.  I mention it to indicate that the stakes for understanding El Nino and the warming of the world oceans are really quite high. 

Thus it is very well worthwhile understanding the six El Nino graphs which are presented below and the follow-on graphs which correlate El Nino with the Earth's Wobble, tectonic activity, and other geophysical trends.  If the causes are all the same for El Nino, the warming of the Arctic, and Global Warming, specifically if the causes are changes in the Earth's Wobble, we have an entire different environmental reality than many have been supposing for the past 60 years.  And, naturally, how to relate to it and deal with it will shift quite radically.

Beyond these graphs and charts, the major long range cycles are presented.  These provide deep background sufficient to demonstrate that the fluctuations which we can see in the trend lines for today's changes in the Earth are remarkably unexceptional.  In fact, as will be quickly understood by perusing the long range cycles, the Earth changes radically, frequently.  This is something we will need to learn to accept.  We are not special, we are subject to a vast array of cosmic forces which impel us constantly to adapt to changing conditions.

To pick a single variable out of  the cosmic flux which produces the climate regimes of Earth, such as CO2 emissions, and to wantonly speculate it into the cause of a dire fate, with little understanding of the fuller fabric of the terrestrial sphere, is typically Faustian, profoundly Western.  In the particular case of CO2, it is a lunatic pandemic.  In its full-press-court dress before the courts of world opinion, the "carbon" campaign has become  a supreme exercise in academic mathematical solipsism which has lost any mooring in real philosophical understanding of the nature of science and the epistemology of real knowledge.  Accordingly, like all such zealous crusades, railing against CO2 emissions will be about as effective as pissing against the wind.

Read on.  I am quite certain that you too will be persuaded by the vast marshaling of evidence which is before you.  You may not admit it for various geo-political, ideological, and egotistical reasons, but I guarantee you that will never be able to screw on your old presumptions like you did before.


Climate Oscillations

Background Information & Knowledge/Data Sources:

 


El Nino La Nina SO & Other Oceanic Climate Oscillations

START HERE FOR ALL THINGS PACIFIC CLIMATE AND GLOBAL WARMING

An Excellent Orientation For Kids Of All Ages:  From the Thinkquest Library

Covers in simple English how scientists are attempting to analyze El Nino, model it into a climate theory, and from that make predictions.

After reading this meta overview, it is easy to immediately spot the two main conceptual blind spots of the weathermen.  The first is that they are completely unfamiliar with the fact that the Earth is spinning to the East, bunching up the crust and fluids of the Earth against the eastern “windward” edges of the continents. Thus they mistake why the water and atmospheric circulation works as it does.  They “see” it as “pressure differentials” created by the “equatorial climate”.  These pressures are likely secondary effects produced indirectly by the rotating mass(es) of the Earth, not primary causes. The second mistake is that their model simply lacks an elementary driver to make it work.  Energy must come into the system to produce El Nino.  To attribute such a source, they mystically bow and scrape to Ozian “feedbacks” just behind the veils of perception.  They are totally oblivious to the driver - the “bunsen burner” at the bottom of the ocean.

La Nina Home Page At NOAA - What Is La Nina – A NOAA compendium of  web pages on La Nina & El Nino

Climate Predictions For El  Nino, La  Nina, & SO
The likely climate for months ahead; current but static SST carts & predictions

FAQs on Nino Nina – excellent range of questions and answers and links to powerful sources and images of information.

ENSO Evolution, Status, and Prediction Presentation (powerpoint)

 

National Weather Service - Climate Prediction Center

Climate Monitoring & Data Index  – this is a very extensive list of many different kinds of data series

Primary Data Series Used By MWM For El Nino Correlations:

Quarterly Data 1950-2006

Year Data 1877-2006

Comparison Charts Of Two Most Powerful La Nina's
How they come on, develop, and disappear

Powerful ENSO Impact Prediction Graphs For Specific Regions

ENSO Impacts The Main Long Range Climate Data Series Related To ENSO

Three Month ENSO Outlooks

Monthly & Seasonal Color Outlook Maps - Predict Rain and Temperatures For North America For The Year Ahead – Science Is Finally Catching Up With Farmer’s Almanac

NOAA Long Lead ENSO Brief In PowerPoint For Year Ahead

A PP Frame:  Most statistical and coupled model forecasts indicate SST anomalies will decrease during the next 2-3 months, with ENSO-neutral conditions lasting through the northern Spring (March-May 2007).

Following PP Frame:  The CFS ensemble mean (heavy blue line) indicates a rapid transition from neutral to La Niña conditions during the next 2-3 months.

Say what?  Say what a forecast.  All things for all folks.  The real news:   LA NINA is already here as of March 12 affecting the weather and this pattern will increase through to the Summer

ENSO FAQtoids

  1. These errata factoids are from the National Climate Prediction Center web pages.

  2. ENSO conditions seem to have occurred at every two to seven years for at least the past 300 years, but most of them have been weak.

  3. Major ENSO events have occurred in the years 1790-93, 1828, 1876-78, 1891, 1925-26, 1982-83, and 1997-98.[9]

  4. Recent El Niños have occurred in 1986-1987, 1991-1992, 1993, 1994, 1997-1998, 2002-2003, and 2006-2007.

  5. The El Niño of 1997-1998 was particularly strong and brought the phenomenon to worldwide attention, while the period from 1990-1994 was unusual in that El Niños have rarely occurred in such rapid succession (but were generally weak). There is some debate as to whether global warming increases the intensity and/or frequency of El Niño episodes. (see also the ENSO and Global Warming section above).

 


Wobble Cycles


Orbital Cycles

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ocean Climate Cycles

 

El Nino - Wobble Correlation Graphs

The story of Global Warming is best begun with the story of the El Nino Cycle and how it parallels with the seven year cycle of the Earth's Wobble. Essentially, the El Nino effect is very nearly like a "Global Warming" effect, though on a more limited scale. If we understand the cause of the El Nino, we may understand much better the cause of Global Warming in general.

Accordingly this part of the Climate Storyboard is composed of 12 graphs or charts.  The first four show display the El Nino years and the spiraling location of the North Spin Axis since 1890.  These are all very similar, differing mainly in size, from book size to full web page size and even into a giant scrolling size  In the Giant size, there is a graph for both the X and Y plots of the location of the North Spin Axis.

The next two graphs, small enough for printing in books, show the average size of the Wobble from 1962 through to 2005.  One of the graphs shows the El Nino years, the other shows the La Nina years .  These are a sort of 'sideways view" of the seven year wobble working through the El Nino cycle. [click here for Wobble Wave Charts].

These first six graphs clearly reveal that the El Nino cycles and the Wobble cycles are "pegged".  They are tied together in some fundamental way which is not obvious yet to most Earth scientists. 

These graphs are followed by two more charts which "peg"  a trend of increasing frequency of severe El Nino years since 1973 with a trend of increasing frequency in the Wobble from approximately the same date.   In other words, scientists have confirmed that the Wobble has become slightly faster during the same period of time during which the total energy expressed in the El Nino Cycle is accelerating into greater extremes.

This "time connection" between the trends must couple these activities to a common cause.  It is difficult to imagine that somehow this connection is just a random fluke.  The question thus must arise, what is the common thread?  What is the connection?  How does the Earth's Wobble create El Nino?

As the Storyboard reveals, it is not up in the Sun, as some might suppose, it is down in the bowels of the Earth.  More probable than not, El Nino comes with the creation of tectonic motion produced by the Wobble which rhythmically releases heat into the oceans through the Great Rifts which run through the middles of the ocean basins.  Five additional charts provide some very strong circumstantial evidence to make exactly this case.

The first graph displays the 35 year fivefold trend of increase in World Earthquake Activity between 1973-2006.  [click to see earthquake trend chart]  This certainly suggests that tectonic motion is increasing at a brisk pace.  Since some geophysicists, for peculiar  reasons known only to themselves, are very good at rationalizing such trends into nothingness, a detailed discussion of why this trend demonstrates a real trend of earthquake activity is provided.

The second graph  displays the 60 year threefold trend of acceleration in world volcanism.  [click to see volcanism trend chart]  This  indicates the Earth itself can easily be supposed to be the producer of El Nino.  Since there are some volcanologists who will ex-cathedra declare there are no trends in world volcanism except the increase in reports about volcanic activity, a detailed discussion of why this trend demonstrates a real trend of volcanic activity is also provided.

These charts collectively seem to demonstrate that a long term trend began in approximately the middle of the 20th century to cause tectonic  motion to increase, which in turn caused earthquake and volcanic activity to increase while the frequency in the Earth's Wobble began to accelerate slightly even as the frequency of severe El Nino increased.

Along these lines, one should take a very careful look at the graphs of the trends of increases in sulfur in the Greenland Ice Core.  The first graph is by Fischer et al (1998) which defines the amount of sulfur and nitrate ions for the period 1800-2000 which they found in ice cores taken from Northern Greenland  [click to see Sulfur Ions Northern Greenland Ice chart]  Their chart demonstrates a rather progressive and large acceleration in volcanic emissions during the last half of the 20th century.

Their chart simply, elegantly, and decisively proved the reality and validity of the  increase of activity which was added up in the graph (above) from the counts of individual volcanoes (Trend of World Volcanism 1900-2006).

The next graph in the sequence displays the acceleration in the warming of the World Ocean since the 1970's.  [click to see chart of the Warming of the World Ocean] This graph by Levitus et al (2005) clearly reveals that additional heat is in fact rising through the oceans from the bottoms and that the rate of flow periodically accelerates and decelerates, alternatively waxing and waning as if tied to other dynamics in the oceans or the Earth. 

As we can see without a shadow of a question of a doubt, we have multiple geophysical dynamics all sequencing in time with each other.  Since about 1960, tectonic motion is increasing and thus earthquake activity is increasing, volcanic activity is increasing,  heat release through the oceans is increasing, frequency of severe El Nino's  increasing, Atlantic hurricane activity in increasing in severity, the Arctic is melting at a more rapid rate, and sulfur ions in the Northern Greenland ice are increasing to "record" this era of acceleration in the changes in the Earth.

Most importantly, the record in the Northern Greenland Ice Core informs us that these changes are all directly connected to a geophysical wave of activity which began in the 20th century.  The century prior to 1880 is a flat line, virtually no flux in the sulfur ions.  The first wave of ions builds from about 1880 through a small increase to about 1940.  Then another major wave begins to develop about 1940 and reaches its peak in about 1970, after which it begins to decline through to the early 1990's. 

The second major wave of sulfur ionic buildup in the ice of Northern Greenland correlates quite well with the curve of warming of the World Ocean.  

Why?  Many climatologists suppose that sulfur ions are from hydrocarbons burned by humans.  Is this plausible?  Partly.  Some of this "curve" may have been caused by human-induced pollution, but it very doubtful that you can correlate all of it to the trends of human industrialization.

The time frame is skewed.  This portion of the Arctic icecap is at a very high latitude and is not likely to have received much xxxx XXX the Clip of the sulfur series in mid 1990's, extension of the warming of the World Ocean curve to 2004.  Does the sulfur in the Ice Core for this 10 year period mirror this movement of heat as well? If it does you can kiss human hydrocarbons good-bye.

All in all, then, the "net parallel" from this combination of phenomena and trend-lines forms very strong circumstantial evidence for a common cause.  In the Wobble charts we can even find the likely cause from a timing signal.  The average location of the Wobble began to shift its location during the 20th century.  This process began early in the 20th century after after many decades of no apparent drift in its location.  After  a decade of drift, a period of instability set-in during the late 1920's which lasted until the early 1940's.  After the century's greatest Solar Activity Cycle (#19 which peaked in 1958/1959),  the drift in the Wobble began to accelerate and a more rapid rate of drift has persisted throughout the  last half of the 20th Century.

Most interestingly, the rate of drift and the angle of drift of the Magnetic North Pole also changed dramatically in this same time window. edit xxx expand discussion and add graph

Thus we can see that the timing of all major geophysical trends directly connects to this curve of change in the Earth's Wobble.  These correlations rather strongly provide the basis for establishing the Vortex Tectonic paradigm as the key focus for Earth Sciences.  

This evidence is, frankly, as good as the evidence upon which Plate Tectonics was initially accepted.  Earth's Wobble rhythmically produces tectonic motion which produces volcanism which in turn creates the El Nino Oscillation, probably the other ocean oscillations,  as well as producing an accumulation of heat in the World Ocean which is then directly increasing the average temperature of the Earth in general as well as heating the Arctic in particular.

As the rate of drift (AKA True Polar Wander) increases, the shape of the Earth is forced to change at a more rapid rate to adjust the average location of the Spin Axis and the average location of the Equator.  This must increase the rate of seismic and volcanic activity, including through the Great Rift of the Earth.  Thus the heat flow into the oceans also MUST be accelerating as a cumulative trend.

In fact this is all occurring ON EXACTLY THE SAME TIME SCHEDULE. 

This chart also allows us to suspect that the acceleration of the Wobble Cycle and the increasing divergence in the drift may very well be driving the increasing acceleration of world volcanism, which in turn is driving the increasing frequency in the severe El Nino Cycles.  And, by extension, all this may be the underlying trends which are producing Global Warming in general.

The final graph in this set displays the composite of the Nine Geophysical Trends which are apparently changing the Earth during this period of time.  As can be easily seen, regardless of whether the Wobble is involved or not, which is going to be a hard grasp for many, underwater volcanism is a far more likely a candidate for the current round of Global Warming than carbon dioxide.

So, all in all, an amazing series of charts.  Not only have we nailed down the most likely cause of El Nino, we have found the direction (straight downward) in which to look for the source of Global Warming   And we have tied all of this into an entirely new mechanism which reveals, really, for the first time, the driver of Plate Tectonics and from this, more or less, the primary generator of the changing surface of the Earth: the Wobble .  This entire set of connections we can very accurately call Vortex Tectonics.

From this brief introduction, you can see we are on a major journey to a new continent of understanding about how the Earth works.  Let us begin the journey sensibly with some simple bar and line graphs which encompass the past 116 years of the El Nino Cycle.  The graphs plot the spiral motions of the Earth's Wobble year by year on top of the years which mark El Nino.  The first three graphs are virtually identical except in horizontal scale.   They start small so that you can get the perspective, see the rhythm of the flow of Earth's tectonic activity.  Then they get bigger and bigger so that you can see in greater and greater precision the exact connection in the timing of the events.  Don't leave these charts till you see the drift and get the rhythm!!!

Technical Note On How The Charts Were Plotted.

  1. All Wobble and El Nino data and plot assumptions are in Spreadsheet File "Wobble_Plots_1846-now.xls" by MWM.  All this data is drawn from IERS or NOAA data files.  Access is from http://www.michaelmandeville.com/gallery/models

  2. Wobble Min and Max years are defined by simple averaging of the x or y coordinates for each year

  3. Wobble locations are simple chart or graph XY coordinate measurements provided by the IERS

  4. The El Nino years are defined by selecting the years in which four months or more contained water warmer than 2 Celcius.

  5. All Global Warming, Earthquake, and Volcano assumptions are in "Vortex_Trends_Summary.xls".
     Access is  from http://www.michaelmandeville.com/gallery/models

 

 

]

El Nino & The Wobble X Plot 1890-2006
area and bar graph in landscape orientation by MWM
image file: pm_xplot_elnino_correlation_1890-2006.gif
model source: 
Wobble_Plots_1846-now.xls

The red bars indicate when the wobble was at its maximum size, the blue bars indicate when the wobble was at its minimum size. For details on the wobble cycle, see the Storyboard for "Earth's Wobble" .

The up and down wavy black line displays the "X" coordinate of the North Spin Axis.  We can say more or less that this is its position  on the Greenwich Meridian, or more accurately we can say that this is its relative change in location coming closer to or drawing away from England.  On the upper peaks, the North Spin Axis is slightly closer to England.

The highest peaks are the MAX phase of the seven year cycle.  The