Temporary cooling of Earth’s climate may be due to volcano

Ars Technica : Despite global warming, global temperatures continue to exhibit sporadic dips. To better understand the year-to-year variability in global surface temperature, a group of researchers developed a series of climate model experiments that looked at the complex relationship between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, the trade winds that blow between them, and their impact on the atmosphere. Despite the model’s complexity, the experiments failed to completely explain the most recent bout of lower-than-average global surface temperatures. According to the researchers, some other factor must be contributing. They point to a volcanic eruption in the Philippines that occurred more than two decades ago: Not only did it lower temperatures for several years immediately following the event, it may have caused widespread climate perturbations that are still being felt today.