How is global warming measured?

March 31, 2016 6:54 PM

1. Not all points can be measured. 2.Which points are measured affect the result. 3. So how is the global temperature determined?

I understand how the temperature for a given city can break a record, because a city generally has a specific point for official measurements. But how is the temperature measured for the entire Earth?

I just read a New York Times article that said “February was the warmest month in recorded history.” How do we know that?

posted by maurreen to Science & Nature (3 answers total)

Lots of measurements and computation. Here are some details.
posted by ssg at 7:01 PM on March 31, 2016

NOAA's Climate Center has a nice little primer to explain how they collect, collate, and compute the data- one of the important things to remember is that since the Earth's surface is mostly water, a lot of data is taken via satellites, ships, and buoy information. The data behind the computations and some explanation are available here - you would be particularly interested in question 2. You can also find more information under the FAQ on the Monitoring References page.

These primers not only go into the how and where, they also explain what historical data is used to create both an ongoing record and a statistical reference in order to compute pronunciations like "warmest February."
posted by barchan at 7:10 PM on March 31, 2016 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Thanks! I know more now than I did before. Those were all good resources.
posted by maurreen at 8:25 PM on April 1, 2016