Hidden amid reports of recent warmest months and years based on global averages, there is a significant departure in North America. Those of us living in Canada and USA have noticed a distinct cooling, and our impressions are not wrong.
The image above shows how much lower have been April 2018 temperatures. The table below provides the numbers behind the graphs from NOAA State of the Climate.
| CONTINENT | ANOMALY (1910-2000) | TREND (1910-2018) | RANK | RECORDS | |||||
| °C | °F | °C | °F | (OUT OF 109 YEARS) | YEAR(S) | °C | °F | ||
| North America | -0.97 | -1.75 | 0.11 | 0.19 | Warmest | 94ᵗʰ | 2010 | 2.65 | 4.77 |
| South America | 1.34 | 2.41 | 0.13 | 0.24 | Warmest | 1ˢᵗ | 2018 | 1.34 | 2.41 |
| Europe | 2.82 | 5.08 | 0.14 | 0.25 | Warmest | 1ˢᵗ | 2018 | 2.82 | 5.08 |
| Africa | 1.23 | 2.21 | 0.12 | 0.22 | Warmest | 5ᵗʰ | 2016 | 1.72 | 3.1 |
| Asia | 1.66 | 2.99 | 0.18 | 0.32 | Warmest | 9ᵗʰ | 2016 | 2.4 | 4.32 |
| Oceania | 2.47 | 4.45 | 0.14 | 0.25 | Warmest | 2ⁿᵈ | 2005 | 2.54 | 4.57 |
The table shows how different was the North American experience: 94th out of 109 years. But when we look at the first four months of the year, the NA is more in line with the rest of the globe.
As the image shows, cooling was more widespread during the first third of 2018, particularly in NA, Northern Europe and Asia, as well as a swath of cooler mid ocean latitudes in the Southern Hemisphere.
| CONTINENT | ANOMALY (1910-2000) | TREND (1910-2018) | RANK | RECORDS | |||||
| °C | °F | °C | °F | (OUT OF 109 YEARS) | YEAR(S) | °C | °F | ||
| North America | 0.44 | 0.79 | 0.16 | 0.29 | Warmest | 44ᵗʰ | 2016 | 2.71 | 4.88 |
| South America | 0.94 | 1.69 | 0.13 | 0.24 | Warmest | 6ᵗʰ | 2016 | 1.39 | 2.5 |
| Europe | 1.35 | 2.43 | 0.13 | 0.24 | Warmest | 13ᵗʰ | 2014 | 2.46 | 4.43 |
| Africa | 1.08 | 1.94 | 0.1 | 0.18 | Warmest | 3ʳᵈ | 2010 | 1.62 | 2.92 |
| Asia | 1.57 | 2.83 | 0.19 | 0.34 | Warmest | 8ᵗʰ | 2002 | 2.72 | 4.9 |
| Oceania | 1.58 | 2.84 | 0.12 | 0.22 | Warmest | 1ˢᵗ | 2018 | 1.58 | 2.84 |
The table confirms that Europe and Asia are cooler in 2018 than recent years in the decade.
Summary
These data show again that temperature indicators of climate are not global but regional, and even local in their manifestations. At the continental level there are significant differences. North America is an outlier, but who is to say whether it is an aberration that will join the rest, or whether it is the trend setter signaling a widespread cooler future.
See Also: Is This Cold the New Normal?
Science Matters 
Alarmists have been going on for years about polar amplification, without knowing the mechanism behind it. When I point out that P-A is nothing more than the Hadley circulation they’ve gone nuts. Why? because none of their sources will mention it. All that those sources do is create a panic by introducing a new, and unexplained, term.
Well, this latest high-latitude cooling is also P-A at work. Note the ENSO pattern since January 2016. A cooling at the equator means less warm air is driven north and south. As the high latitudes radiate heat there is no source of heat to replace it. So, there is more rapid cooling at high latitudes while the equator is cool, just as there was more rapid warming while the equator was warm.
But i don’t think that will impress alarmists. To them science is unreliable if we take politics out of it.
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Thanks for commenting Oort. I agree. The transport of solar energy is from the equator to the poles, and at higher latitudes more by air than by sea. Incursions of warm moist southern air produce the warming, so called Polar Amplification. More or less meridional transfer is therefore exaggerated near the poles. And the effect is further distorted by showing anomalies rather than actual temp change.
More at https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2017/01/28/temperature-misunderstandings/
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