<h2>December update on 2014 warmth.</h2>

NOAA has posted their report on November 2014 (h/t DK). It shows a global anomaly relative to 1901-2000 of 0.65°C. This is down from October's 0.74°C. TempLS grid was down 0.11°C, which looks like very good agreement, but is something of a break with the recent eerily close tracking.

They may take a few days to update the detailed MLOST file that I normally use (base 1961-90), so, with Christmas coming, I'll use a synthetic value by dropping the Oct value by 0.09°C too, so as to produce the last of the anticipatory posts about record prospects.

I'm following the format of an earlier post, with sequel here. You can click buttons to rotate through datasets (HAD 4, GISS, NOAA, TempLS mesh and grid, and HADSST3). I haven't shown the satellite troposphere indices, because these are nowhere near a record. The plot is cumulative sums of monthly ave relative to 2010, the next highest. I see that NOAA has a similar plot, but with average to date rather than total. This is just a scale difference, becoming small near end year.

Highlights are, first HADSST3, which is way ahead of 2010. In fact, for that, 1998 was higher, at 0.43°C, but that level too should be exceeded. This emphasises that high SST was the driver for 2014.

GISS is less clear; Nov 2014 was cooler while Nov 2010 was warm, so it's prospects receded slightly. Meanwhile, my NCEP/NCAR daily index showed the first week or so in December very cool, but then warmer. So GISS is no certainty. However, Dec 2010 was quite cool. NOAA is well ahead, and while there is no November data for HADCRUT 4, it is also well placed.

The plot is below the jump:

The index will be a record if it ends the year above the axis. Months warmer than the 2010 average make the line head upwards.

Use the buttons to click through.