In 2024 it can be difficult to sort wheat from chaff in the peer-reviewed literature. There has always been better and worse science — that goes with the territory — but as I argued last week, we are now in an era of tactical research, with science curated to advance narratives over knowledge. That makes knowing what’s what even more difficult.

I spend a lot of time here at THB on the chaff, and by reader request, I am going to try to spend more time also on the wheat. To that end, this week has already seen cross my desk an unusually large number of really interesting recent peer-reviewed papers that I’m sharing with you today. Let’s get to it . . .

A recent surge in global warming is not detectable yet (Beaulieu et al. 2024, open access). Top line results: 

“Our results show limited evidence for a warming surge; in most surface temperature time series, no change in the warming rate beyond the 1970s is detected despite the breaking record temperatures observed in 2023.” 

The paper employs the traditional IPCC framework for detection and attribution and assess what levels of global temperature increases would have to occur to achieve detection. The authors find that the recent “surge” is not very close to that magnitude of increase: 

“Accounting for the short-term variability in the HadCRUT GMST over 1970–2023 and the added uncertainty for the changepoint location, the second segment (2013–2023) would need a slope of at least 0.039∘C/year (more than a 100% increase) to be statistically different than 0.019 at the α = 0.05 significance level right now. The estimated slope of 0.029 ∘C/year falls far short of this needed increase. While it is still possible there was a change in the warming rate starting in 2013, the HadCRUT record is simply not long enough for the surge to be statistically detectable at this time.”

This paper is sure to motivate much debate as it is contrary to gobsmacking claims made by some visible scientists. Debate is good for science and for science in the public eye.

Crucial role of sea surface temperature warming patterns in near-term high-impact weather and climate projection (Zhao and Knutson 2024, open access). Top line results:

• “Model biases in SST [sea surface temperature] trend patterns are shown to have profound implications for near-term projections of high-impact storm statistics, including the frequency of atmospheric rivers, tropical storms and mesoscale convection systems, as well as for hydrological and climate sensitivity. If the future SST warming pattern continues to resemble the observed pattern from the past few decades rather than the model-simulated/predicted patterns, these results suggest:
  • A drastically different future projection of high-impact storms and their associated hydroclimate changes, especially over the Western Hemisphere.
  • Stronger global hydrological sensitivity.
  • Substantially less global warming due to stronger negative feedback and lower climate sensitivity.”

This paper identifies systematic biases in how climate models represent ocean temperatures and explores the implications of these biases for projections of the climate future. The paper concludes:

“Our results indicate that if the future SST trend pattern continues to resemble the observed pattern from the past few decades rather than that simulated or predicted by climate models, we would anticipate a drastically different picture of future changes of high-impact storm statistics . . .”

This paper as well will likely motivate some interesting discussions and future work. The most important implication for consumers of climate research is to recognize that our near-term climate future likely encompasses a much wider range of possibilities than we (collectively) generally expect or hear discussed.

Robust future projections of global spatial distribution of major tropical cyclones and sea level pressure gradients (Murakami et al. 2024, open access).

I found this paper particularly interesting because it was published just a few weeks before Hurricanes Helene and Milton made landfall on the U.S. Gulf Coast, killing hundreds and resulting in tens of billions of dollars in economic losses. As you can see in the figure below this new paper projects a significant decrease (blue shading) in the strongest hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico.

I share this paper not because I believe its projections over other studies — actually, tell me what result you want for projected future hurricane incidence and I can produce a peer-reviewed study to support that view! — but because it is at odds with major media reporting and claims by activists (including some scientists) about trends and projections in hurricanes. The gap between popular climate discourse and peer reviewed research (including the assessments of the IPCC WG1) remains massive. This paper offers another timely example.

Can the recent sex-specific evolutions in elite running performances be attributed to advanced footwear technology? (Mason et al. 2024, open access).

This is a fun and interesting paper, which seeks to understand why elite women runners are running so much faster. The gains made by female runners using so-called “super-shoe” technology are much greater than gains made by elite men. The paper argues that understanding this issue lacks evidence because most studies are of men, and neglect women. The authors explore,

“why women may be benefiting from the new generation of shoes more than men, suggest potential mechanisms leading to hypotheses that need to be further investigated in upcoming studies, and finally propose that factors outside of footwear innovation may have concurrently driven the recently observed performance evolutions.”

This article was originally published on Roger’s Substack, The Honest Broker. If you enjoyed this piece, please consider subscribing here.