UK Met figures ‘confirm pause’

BRITAIN’S Met Office has confirmed the “pause” in average global surface temperatures had continued last year.

BRITAIN’S Met Office has confirmed the “pause” in average global surface temperatures had continued last year which ranked among the 10 warmest years of the past two decades but could not be declared a record.

Global temperature data compiled by the Met Office and the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit showed 2014 was 0.56C above the long term 1961-1990 average.

“Nominally this ranks 2014 as the joint warmest year in the record, tied with 2010, but the uncertainty ranges mean it’s not possible to definitively say which of several recent years was the warmest,” the Met Office said.

Met Office climate monitoring scientist Colin Morice said uncertainties in the estimates of global temperature were larger than the difference between the warmest years.

“This limits what we can say about individual years,” Mr Morice said.

“We can say with confidence that 2014 is one of the 10 warmest years in the series and that it adds to the set of near-record temperatures we have seen over the last two decades.”

Why global surface temperatures have “paused” at a high level despite a continued strong rise in the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has been the subject of fierce debate.

Several theories have been published including increased heat uptake in the world’s oceans and increased volcanic activity.

Climate scientist Phil Jones, of the University of East Anglia, said 2014 was an exceptionally warm year with warm tropical Pacific temperatures, despite not being officially regarded as an El Niño.