Is ocean warming accelerating faster than thought? In a word, no.

by Nic Lewis, January 22, 2019 in WUWT


There are a number of statements in Cheng et al. (2019) ‘How fast are the oceans warming’, (‘the paper’) that appear to be mistaken and/or potentially misleading. My analysis of these issues is followed by a reply from the paper’s authors.

Contrary to what the paper indicates:

  • Contemporary estimates of the trend in 0–2000 m depth ocean heat content over 1971–2010 are closely in line with that assessed in the IPCC AR5 report five years ago

  • Contemporary estimates of the trend in 0–2000 m depth ocean heat content over 2005–2017 are significantly (> 95% probability) smaller than the mean CMIP5 model simulation trend.