Late Quaternary temperature variability described as abrupt transitions on a 1/ f noise background

In order to have a scaling description of the climate system that is not inherently non-stationary, the rapid shifts between stadials and interstadials during the last glaciation (the Dansgaard-Oeschger events) cannot be included in the scaling law. The same is true for the shifts between the glacia...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Published in:Earth System Dynamics
Main Authors: M. Rypdal, K. Rypdal
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Copernicus Publications 2016
Subjects:
Q
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-7-281-2016
https://doaj.org/article/6fa3acf8fac44650a10ee9421550f42f
Description
Summary:In order to have a scaling description of the climate system that is not inherently non-stationary, the rapid shifts between stadials and interstadials during the last glaciation (the Dansgaard-Oeschger events) cannot be included in the scaling law. The same is true for the shifts between the glacial and interglacial states in the Quaternary climate. When these events are omitted from a scaling analysis the climate noise is consistent with a 1/ f law on timescales from months to 10 5 years. If the shift events are included, the effect is a break in the scaling with an apparent 1/ f β law, with β > 1, for the low frequencies. No evidence of multifractal intermittency has been found in any of the temperature records investigated, and the events are not a natural consequence of multifractal scaling.