The December 2019 temperature was up by 0.12C from November at 1.01C relative to 1961-1990. This completes the annual global average temperature for 2019 making it the second warmest year at 0.86C. This is just 0.015C cooler than 2016. All these values are calculated using GHCN-V4 and HadSST3 and spherical triangulation.
Here is the temperature distribution for December
Notice in particular the warmer than average temperatures across Australia, parts of the US and Northern Europe plus the ocean hot spot west of New Zealand.
Here are the final trend results for 2019
Recent Monthly temperature trends
and the Annual trends showing 2019 slightly cooler than 2016.
Annual average temperature anomalies
So 2019 ended with a warm December and Australia suffering terrible bush fires. I will be there in 3 weeks time and was planning to first visit the Blue Mountains.
- Full monthly values can be downloaded here
- Full annual values can be downloaded here
How does this 18 year temperature record compare to the 20th century record?
Is it even an important comparison to be made?
As a non-expert, I am curious at to what conclusions you draw from the data. Seems to play into the hand of panic-stricken climate catastrophists, does it not?
I am only showing recent years to compare them directly with 2019.
My result back to 1850 are basically the same as everyone else – so about 1C of warming in total.
What’s the margin of error? When you’re talking about tenths (and hundredths) of a degree, that may be important to know.
John,
There are two different sources of error. The first is a statistical error and this is rather small for recent years since V4 has over 14000 stations. Likewise HadSST3 has good coverage. I estimate this error at <0.01C.
However there is a second systematic source of error whinch depends on the spatial integration method that is used to calculate the global average. Obviously I think my method is the best although the SST data has already been processed by Hadley into 5*5 degree bins. Other groups use different averaging methods and some use ERSST3 instead for SST.
If you compare my result with Nick Stokes you find that usually we agree to within 0.03C each month. He uses ERSST3. So while it makes sense to quote values to within 0.01C, different methodologies only agree to within roughly 0.02C
The fires should be mostly out by the time you get to Australia. Good rain predicted here this week.