Five-Year Average Global Temperature Anomalies from 1881 to 2008 for Science On a Sphere

  • Released Tuesday, April 21, 2009
View full credits

Each year, scientists at NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies analyze global temperature data. A rapid warming trend has occurred over the past 30 years. Calendar year 2008 was the coolest year since 2000, according to the Goddard Institute for Space Studies analysis of surface air temperature measurements. In this analysis, 2008 is the ninth warmest year in the period of instrumental measurements, which extends back to 1881. 2005 is the hottest year on record, and 2007 is tied with 1998 for second place. The Earth is experiencing the warmest level of the current interglacial period, or interval between ice ages, which has lasted nearly 12,000 years. This color-coded map displays a long term progression of changing global surface temperatures, from 1881 to 2008. Dark red indicates the greatest warming and dark blue indicates the greatest cooling.

This data visualization of five-year global temperature differences from 1880 to 2008 was designed to be shown on the Science On a Sphere. Dark blue areas show regions where the temperature was cooler then the average temperature. Red areas show regions where the temperature was warmer then the average. This particular image show the global average from 2004 to 2008.

Colorbar - blue represents cooler then average regions and red represents warmer then average regions.

Colorbar - blue represents cooler then average regions and red represents warmer then average regions.

This image is a five year average from 1881 to 1885.

This image is a five year average from 1881 to 1885.

This image is a five year average from 1891 to 1895.

This image is a five year average from 1891 to 1895.

This image is a five year average from 1901 to 1905.

This image is a five year average from 1901 to 1905.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1911 to 1915.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1911 to 1915.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1921 to 1925.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1921 to 1925.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1931 to 1935.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1931 to 1935.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1941 to 1945.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1941 to 1945.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1951 to 1955.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1951 to 1955.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1961 to 1965.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1961 to 1965.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1971 to 1975.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1971 to 1975.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1981 to 1985.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1981 to 1985.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1991 to 1995.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 1991 to 1995.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 2001 to 2005.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 2001 to 2005.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 2002 to 2006.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 2002 to 2006.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 2003 to 2007.

This image is a five year global temperature average from 2003 to 2007.

Credits

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio Data provided by Robert B. Schmunk (NASA/GSFC GISS)

This page was originally published on Tuesday, April 21, 2009.
This page was last updated on Wednesday, May 3, 2023 at 1:54 PM EDT.

Series

This page can be found in the following series:

Related papers

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/earth_temp.html

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/earth_temp.html

Datasets used

  • GISTEMP [GISS Surface Temperature Analysis (GISTEMP)]

    ID: 585
    Type: Model Sensor: GISS Surface Temperature Analysis (GISTEMP) Collected by: NASA/GISS Dates used: 1880 - 2007

    The GISS Surface Temperature Analysis version 4 (GISTEMP v4) is an estimate of global surface temperature change. Graphs and tables are updated around the middle of every month using current data files from NOAA GHCN v4 (meteorological stations) and ERSST v5 (ocean areas), combined as described in our publications Hansen et al. (2010) and Lenssen et al. (2019).

    Credit: Lenssen, N., G. Schmidt, J. Hansen, M. Menne, A. Persin, R. Ruedy, and D. Zyss, 2019: Improvements in the GISTEMP uncertainty model. J. Geophys. Res. Atmos., 124, no. 12, 6307-6326, doi:10.1029/2018JD029522.

    This dataset can be found at: https://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/

    See all pages that use this dataset

Note: While we identify the data sets used on this page, we do not store any further details, nor the data sets themselves on our site.