Not the hottest January in the troposphere, but way hotter than normal in the Arctic

The troposphere temperatures for January 2017 were released earlier this month. The lower troposphere is recorded in UAH v6 and RSS TLT v3.3. This report also covers RSS TTT for the troposphere (without the "lower") and follows pretty much the same format as previous monthly updates.

For RSS TTT (troposphere), the 12 months to January 2017 remain the hottest 12 months in the record (comparing similar Feb-Jan periods). January itself was the just the fifth hottest January, with January 2016 the hottest.

The lower troposphere (UAH v6) also showed the 12 months to January as the hottest on record. However, January was only the seventh hottest January on record, with January 2016 the hottest.

Greenland 2015: Anthony Watts denies Arctic amplification

Arctic amplification means that surface temperatures in the high northern latitudes are rising faster than elsewhere. The reasons for this include positive feedbacks from the reduced ice cover as the world heats up.

Anthony Watts has announced that he's an Arctic amplification denier (archived here). He doesn't "believe" this is happening:

Figure 1 | Temperatures anomaly for the period 2001-2015 by latitude. The base period is 1951-1980. The chart clearly shows the Arctic amplification to the right. Data source: GISS NASA

Actually, I don't think Anthony knows what Arctic amplification is. In his blog article at WUWT today, he was writing about a new paper on the Greenland melt of 2015, saying:

And in this case, they are citing a single event to claim “Arctic amplification” has set in. 

There are all sorts of things wrong with that sentence.