The climate variable series
The file Climate.txt contains annual average values of three climate series from 1958 to 2009. The first column is the year, the second is the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration in parts per million, the third is the global temperature anomaly and the fourth is the southern oscillation index. These are used in an analysis presented in section 9.2 of the book.
Of further interest may be the updated set of slightly different series in the file ClimateData.txt. These are again average annual values, but from 1959 to 2014, and the first column is the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration in parts per million. The second column is the global land surface termperature anomaly, the third is the global sea surface termperature anomaly and the fourth is the southern oscillation index. A structural VAR model is developed for these series in the paper ClimateModel.pdf which also describes the sources of the data. There are slight differences between the two data files due to the different data sources and processing. The model estimates the effect of the increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide on global temperatures. The picture above is a reminder that global warming is leading to a rapid loss of north polar summer ice with adverse effects on the survival of polar bears.