Decoupling of air and sea temperatures from Pacific Decadal Oscillation in Hawai‘i since 1975

Figure 2-4  Top Panel—Air Temperature in Hawai‘i (red line) prior to 1975 is tightly coupled to the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) (blue line). Since 1975, air temperature (red line) has diverged increasingly from the observed PDO, which may indicate the increasing influence of climate change in the Central North Pacific sub-region. Bottom Panel—Local sea-surface temperature anomalies (blue line) for 22°N, 156°W based on the Extended Reconstructed Sea-Surface Temperatures (ERSST) data set (Smith & Reynolds, 2004) are also coupled to air temperatures (red line) in Hawai‘i and show a similar decoupling around 1975. (©2008 American Geophysical Union. Reproduced/modified from Giambelluca et al. [2008] by permission of American Geophysical Union.)