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Quarterly Climate Monitoring Reports

The following reports are produced quarterly and contain a set of images showing standard climate indicators.

Reports

First Quarter 2011

Second Quarter 2011

Thrid Quarter 2011



Annual England and Wales Precipitation (EWP)

Thumbnail of England and Wales annual precipitation
full size image The monthly time-series of England and Wales total precipitation (EWP) begins in 1766. The series is currently based on weighted averages of daily observations from a network of stations in five regions. It is the longest instrumental series of this kind in the world. Daily data begin in 1931. Data are available for EWP and for nine individual regions of the UK, including Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Thumbnail of England and Wales seasonal precipitation
full size image This graph shows how summer and winter rainfall over England and Wales have changed since 1873.

Central England Temperature and England and Wales Precipitation

Thumbnail of daily Central England Temperatures and England and Wales precipitation
full size image Central England Temperature (CET) is representative of a roughly triangular area of the United Kingdom enclosed by Bristol, Manchester and London. The monthly series begins in 1659, and to date is the longest available instrumental record of temperature in the world. The three lines in the upper panel represent the daily maximum, mean and minimum Central England Temperatures. Where the daily values are above average, the line is coloured orange, where they fall below, the line is blue. Dark red and dark blue indicate that the daily temperature lay outside the range bounded by the 5th and 95th percentiles. The quarterly averages (January to March) for the minimum, mean and maximum are summarised in the upper-right-hand panel.

The England and Wales Precipitation series, which extends back to 1766, provides a homogeneity-adjusted series of areally-averaged precipitation. The dark blue bars show the daily precipitation totals. The red line shows the cumulative precipitation total for the quarter. The blue shaded area indicates the lowest and highest cumulative totals and the dotted lines mark the 5th and 95th percentiles of accumulation based on statistics from the 1931 onwards daily series as a whole. The lower right-hand panel shows the three-month total for this quarter in red.

North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO)

Thumbnail of Winter North Atlantic Oscillation index
full size image The North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) is a phenomenon associated with fluctuations in temperatures, rainfall and storminess over much of Europe, especially in winter. When the NAO is 'positive' in winter, westerly winds are stronger or more persistent, northern Europe tends to be warmer and wetter than average and southern Europe colder and drier. When the NAO is 'negative' in winter, westerly winds are weaker or less persistent, northern Europe is colder and drier and southern Europe warmer and wetter than average. One of the simplest definitions of the NAO is that it is the difference in pressure at sea-level between the Azores and Iceland

Annual global and hemispheric near-surface temperatures

Thumbnail of Annual global and hemispheric near-surface temperatures
full size image The global and hemispheric near-surface temperature series are calculated from regular measurements of air temperature at fixed long-term land stations and from sea-surface temperatures. The data from HadCRUT3 are produced in collaboration with the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia.

Annual global near-surface temperatures

Thumbnail of Annual global near-surface temperatures
full size image The global near-surface temperatures can also be given as the differences from the average values at the beginning of the 20th century. The final value for an incomplete year (green bar) is a preliminary value. Please note that until June the final value is not likely to be representative of the year as a whole. This is due to higher variability in the northern hemisphere during the winter period and the frequently different behaviour of later parts of the year. The data from HadCRUT3 are produced in collaboration with the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia.

Different surface temperature estimates

Thumbnail of Different surface temperature estimates
full size image This graph shows how independently measured sea-surface temperature, air temperature from fixed long-term stations over land and air temperature over the oceans have followed similar trends through time. The data have been filtered to show the longer-term fluctuations. Data are from CRUTEM3, HadSST2 and MOHMAT.

ENSO monitoring

Thumbnail of Nino region 3.4 average sea-surface temperatures
full size image The El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon is a large-scale, natural fluctuation of the ocean-atmosphere system centred across the tropical to sub-tropical Indo-Pacific region. Through teleconnections to higher latitudes in both hemispheres, ENSO impacts can extend to near-global dimensions during strong phases of its El Niño or La Niña extremes.

Warm El Niño events in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean in 1982-83, 1987, and 1997-98 coincided with global warmth, but El Niño events are often followed by cooler La Niña events as in 1985, 1988 and 1998-99. SSTs have been extracted from HadISST from an area between 150°W and 90°W, 5°N and 5°S.

Gridded surface temperatures

Thumbnail of monthly near-surface temperature anomalies from HadCRUT3
full size image Regions of the Earth's surface experiencing warmer or cooler than normal conditions can be easily identified from surface temperature charts. These monthly charts are produced using in situ observations of sea surface temperature measured from ships and buoys and air temperature data gathered at a global network of land stations. The data from HadCRUT3 are produced in collaboration with the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia.

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