Page 341 - Earth's Climate Past and Future
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CHAPTER 17 • Climatic Changes Since the 1800s 317
Borehole ground temperature
A
1500 2000
Year
1
0.5
0
K/100 years
B
FIGURE 17-13 Ground temperature (A) Ground temperature profiles have been measured at
hundreds of stations at middle and high latitudes. (B) Model simulations based on these profiles
show a warming on all continents from the 1500s (far-left bar) to the 1900s (far-right bar). (Adapted
from S. Huang et al., “Temperature Trends over the Past Five Centuries Reconstructed from Borehole
Temperature,” Nature 403 [2000]: 756–8.)
IN SUMMARY, instrumental measurements of Satellite Observations
temperature at the surface, in the subsurface ocean,
The range of measurements of Earth’s climate
and in the ground, along with measurements of
increased markedly with the advent of satellite sensors
mass balance of mountain glaciers, provide
in the late 1900s. Different satellite sensors have come
consistent evidence that a large warming has
on line at different times, including a few within the
occurred during the last 125 years.
last decade.
