Penn State
Penn State Data Commons

Find Data: Data Discovery

Data Summary

 Back to Search Results
TitleSupplementary data, code, and information for ‘The likelihood of recent warmth’ (Nature Scientific Reports, Mann et al. 2016)
Date2016
Abstract2014 was nominally the warmest year on record for both the globe and northern hemisphere based on historical records spanning the past one and a half centuries. It was the latest in a recent run of record temperatures spanning the past decade and a half. Press accounts reported odds as low as one-in-650 million that the observed run of global temperature records would be expected to occur in the absence of human-caused global warming. Press reports notwithstanding, the question of how likely observed temperature records may have have been both with and without human influence is interesting in its own right. Here we attempt to address that question using a semi-empirical approach that combines the latest (CMIP5) climate model simulations with observations of global and hemispheric mean temperature. We find that individual record years and the observed runs of record-setting temperatures were extremely unlikely to have occurred in the absence of human-caused climate change, though not nearly as unlikely as press reports have suggested. These same record temperatures were, by contrast, quite likely to have occurred in the presence of anthropogenic climate forcing.
MetadataClick here for full metadata
Data DOIdoi:10.26208/fp6n-xb08

Researchers
Mann, M. E.
Penn State Department of Meteorology
Rahmstorf , S.
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research
Steinman, B. A.
Penn State Department of Meteorology
Tingley , M.
Penn State
Miller, S. K.
Penn State Department of Meteorology

Data Access


References
Mann, M.E., Rahmstorf, S., Steinman, B.A., Tingley, M., Miller, S.K., The Likelihood of Recent Record Warmth, Scientific Reports, 6, 19831, 2016.