
Temperature proxies from ice cores
Some
climatologists and
climate modelers argue for a '1500-year climate cycle' in the North Atlantic region.
[ A Pervasive Millennial-Scale Cycle in North Atlantic Holocene and Glacial Climates, Bond, G., , , Science, ] In their view, many if not most of the
Dansgaard-Oeschger events of the last ice age, conform to a 1500-year pattern, as do some climate events of later eras, like the
Little Ice Age, the
8.2 kiloyear event, and the start of the
Younger Dryas.
The hypothesis holds that the 1500-year cycle displays
nonlinear behavior and
stochastic resonance; not every instance of the pattern is a significant climate event, though some rise to major prominence in environmental history.
[1] Causes and determining factors of the cycle are under study; researchers have focused attention on patterns of tides, variations in solar output, and "reorganizations of atmospheric circulation."
[2]
Looking backward from the present, the following events appear to conform to a general 1500-year pattern. (Evidence is more problematic, and certainty weaker, farther back in time.)
★ 700 years
before the present (BP), or 1300
AD — the start of the
Little Ice Age (by some calculations); the
Great Famine of 1315–1317
★ 2200 BP, or 200
BCE — ?
★ 3700 BP, or 1700 BCE — ?
★ 5200 BP, or 3200 BCE — the
Piora Oscillation
★ 6700 BP, or 4700 BCE — ?
★ 8200 BP, or 6200 BCE — the
8.2 kiloyear event
★ 9700 BP, or 7700 BCE — ?
★ 11,200 BP, or 9200 BCE — ?
★ 12,700 BP, or 10,700 BCE — the start of the
Younger Dryas
★ 14,200 BP, or 12,200 BCE — the
Older Dryas.
Global warming skeptics have used the 1500-year climate cycle to argue against anthropogenic
global warming;
[3] but the hypothesis itself exists independent of political considerations. One leading researcher in this area has been Dr. Gerard C. Bond of the
Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at
Columbia University.
[4]
References
1. Cox, John D. ''Climate Crash: Abrupt Climate Change and What It Means for Our Future.'' Washington DC, Joseph Henry Press, 2005; pp. 150-5.
2. Cox, pp. 154-5.
3. Avery, Dennis T., and Siegfried Fred Singer. ''Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1500 Years.'' New York, Rowman & Littlefield, 2006.
4. National Research Council (U.S.) ''Radiative Forcing of Climate Change: Expanding the Concept and Addressing Uncertainties.'' Washington DC, National Academies Press, 2005; p. 192.