[peeker01]

Me either.When you read this short article, you'll know why.....

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... d=88520025

[Sixstrings]

I've heard of Argo, but I *thought* the program still getting ramped up -- this article is from 2008.

Two things I've been waiting on to really decide about climate change.. satellite ocean temp data, and the Argo results.

Doesn't sound like they're seeing any evidence for warming in the oceans, but that could be due to El Nino:

"There has been a very slight cooling, but not anything really significant," Willis says. So the buildup of heat on Earth may be on a brief hiatus. "Global warming doesn't mean every year will be warmer than the last. And it may be that we are in a period of less rapid warming."

In recent years, heat has actually been flowing out of the ocean and into the air. This is a feature of the weather phenomenon known as El Nino. So it is indeed possible the air has warmed but the ocean has not. But it's also possible that something more mysterious is going on.

However, sea levels are rising:

Willis says some of this water is apparently coming from a recent increase in the melting rate of glaciers in Greenland and Antarctica.

"But in fact there's a little bit of a mystery. We can't account for all of the sea level increase we've seen over the last three or four years," he says.

One possibility is that the sea has, in fact, warmed and expanded — and scientists are somehow misinterpreting the data from the diving buoys.

But if the aquatic robots are actually telling the right story, that raises a new question: Where is the extra heat all going?

I hate this climate change issue. I really, really hate it. I thought the Argo network was going to answer everything.. now just more questions.. is it El Nino? Has the ocean expanded? Are scientists misinterpreting the buoy data?

[peeker01]

I'm guessing this is what Trenberth was wringing his hands over when climategate started.

[rockdoc123]

on one of the other climate threads there was a discussion regarding Argo data and how it relates to ocean heat content and sea level. Notwithstanding the fact that my opponent there couldn't get it through his mind the difference between satellite, streamer and bouy ocean heat measurements, what was pointed out is the early phase of Argo 2002-2005 had some problems with bouy measurements which were corrected. The Argo data from 2005 onwards, albeit a protracted period, is the best data according to the experts at NASA. There are still the outstanding arguments about what happens in the oceans below the depth at which Argo measures but that is another topic.

[peeker01]

More Argo info:

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/01/06/n ... l-missing/