11/6/21, 10:26 AM Defining a true 'pre-industrial' climate period - BBC News

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Defining a true 'pre-industrial' climate period

Jonathan Amos

Science correspondent

@BBCAmos

25 January 2017

Climate change

GETTY IMAGES

Cool times: A depiction of a 17th Century Frost Fair at Temple Stairs on London's Thames River

Scientists are seeking to define a new baseline from which to measure global
temperatures - a time
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11/6/21, 10:26 AM Defining a true 'pre-industrial' climate period - BBC News

At the moment, researchers tend to use the period 1850-1900, and this will
often be described as "pre-industrial".

But the reality is that this date range came after industry really got going.

And the influence of humans on the climate was already in play, judging from
the ice cores that retain a record of carbon dioxide emissions.

These show a perceptible uptick by 1850-1900; likewise for other greenhouse

gases such as methane.

It is these inconsistencies that prompted Ed Hawkins from Reading University

and colleagues to look for a more appropriate historical reference period.

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And in a new paper published in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological

Society (BAMS), they suggest 1720-1800 might serve as a better "starting
line".

On one level, this is a bit of geekery. We know very well what temperatures are
doing today, and have a very detailed picture certainly through the 20th
Century. That should suffice.

But giving policy-makers a more precise picture of how human-induced global

warming has taken hold might better inform the targets they set.

Remember, the Paris agreement sought to maintain global average

temperatures to "well below 2C above pre-industrial levels and to pursue
efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels".

The most recent UK Met Office analysis indicates 2016 was "around 1.1C"
above this 1850-1900 baseline.

But if this reference is wrongly set, and possibly now adjusted, it potentially
changes how we view the policy targets.

Re-draw the baseline to a warmer or cooler starting point and it will take us
either further away or closer to those targets.

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Ed Hawkins: Paris didn't define what is meant by 'pre-industrial'

As with all things climate, the issue is a complex one. 1720-1800 has the
advantage that it encompasses a time in which fossil fuel use and industrial
production was still nascent (James Watt patented his game-changing steam
engine condenser in 1769).

And it also avoids some of the big natural impacts that can perturb the
climate.

For example, the early 1800s are marked by some truly colossal volcanic
eruptions, such as in 1809 (location unknown) and in 1815 (Tambora).

The ash and sulphur emissions from these volcanoes would have depressed
global temperatures.

Likewise, if you go back much before 1720, you enter a period when the Sun
was particularly inactive; there were remarkably few sunspots for instance (the
so-called Maunder Minimum). This too would have damped global
temperatures.

Most of the Frost Fairs on the London Thames occurred before 1720.

But that was one city in one part of the world. How do you go about
establishing what temperatures were doing across the globe - which is what
you need for a proper baseline?

1850-1900 was chosen precisely because there is a reasonable instrument

record of climate worldwide.

Go back into 1720-1800 and long-term temperature records become very

sparse. There is a very good one for Central England (back to 1659), and a
couple on the continent (Netherlands from 1706; and Central Europe from
1760).

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NASA/SDO

Factors that can perturb the climate include solar activity

Dr Hawkins' group used these, together with their understanding of how

factors such as greenhouse gases influence the climate, and some modelling,
to try to gauge what global temperatures were doing during 1720-1800 - to in
essence see if conditions were warmer or cooler than for 1850-1900.

And in their assessment, they were likely cooler.

"We can assess that there has been a certain amount of temperature change
from 1850-1900 up to now, and we think that amount is a lower limit on how
much temperature (change) there has been since the true pre-industrial
period," Dr Hawkins told BBC News.

But the Reading scientist cautions that the uncertainties make it impossible to
say precisely how much additional warming there has been if you take 1720-
1800 as a new starting point.

"In our paper, we give a broad range because of the uncertainties, but the
difference is somewhere between minus 0.05C to plus 0.20C, and we're saying
it's likely above zero."

You could narrow the uncertainties somewhat - for example, by rescuing the
millions of 18th-and-19th-century temperature observations that currently sit
in books around the world but have yet to be collated and digitised. Or you
could simply abandon the notion of an 1850-1900 reference altogether and
just use a modern comparison.

"This is an option that policy-makers might choose," said Dr Hawkins.

"We obviously have much better observations now and over the past few
decades, and so the policy-makers may want to reframe the question. So
instead of being, 'Can we keep
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becomes 'Can we limit ourselves to an amount below, say, the last 20 years or
so?'.

"We would be able to monitor progress far more accurately given that - but it
is up to the policy-makers to decide whether that's appropriate or not."

Follow Jonathan on Twitter.

Related Topics

Met Office Greenhouse gas emissions Meteorology

Paris climate agreement Climate change University of Reading

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