22 replies to this topic

[Shortpoet-GTD]

NOAA is saying there is a 70% chance for another El Nino year.
El Nino's main claim to fame is warming the oceans (surface) waters in the central and eastern
equatorial Pacific ocean.

But even if another El Nino doesn't emerge, 2014 is being on track to be the hottest year yet.

Oi.

Article (with chart) via Mother Jones.
http://www.motherjon...-record-el-nino

[Shortpoet-GTD]

Guardian article reports 90% chance via ECMWF.
http://www.theguardi...no-weather-2014

[Dustoffer]

The cartoon is a hoot!!

2014 SkS Weekly Digest #24

Posted on 15 June 2014 by John Hartz

SkS Highlights

"Dana's In charts: how a revenue neutral carbon tax cuts emissions, creates jobs, grows the economy attracted the most comments of the articles posted on SkS during the past week. Scientists in focus – Lyman and Johnson explore the rapidly warming oceans by John Abraham contains an amazing photo of a fellow scientist seemingly defying gravity on the underside of a protruding rock.
El Niño Watch

• El Niño could make U.S. weather more extreme during 2014 by Kevin Schultz, Scientific American, June 13, 2014
  
• El Nino is ‘already here’ by Steff Gaulter, Al Jazeera, June 15, 2014
  
• How El Niño will change the world's weather in 2014 by Damian Carrington, Suzanne Goldenberg &  Graham Readfearn, The Guardian, June 11, 2014
  
• Hurricane Cristina just set a scary record by Chris Mooney, Climate Desk/Moother Jones, June 12, 2014

Toon of the Week


h/t to I Heart Climate Scientists
Quote of the Week

Scientists around the world have been warning us for decades about the consequences of our wasteful lifestyles, and evidence for the ever-increasing damage caused by pollution and climate change continues to grow. But we have to do more than just wean ourselves off fossil fuels. We must also look to economic systems, progress measurements and ways of living that don’t depend on destroying everything the planet provides to keep us healthy and alive."
http://www.skeptical...-Digest_24.html

[Shortpoet-GTD]

El Nino may not be "official" but hurricane season is ahead of schedule and producing some heavy duty storms
in the Eastern Pacific; breaking records (although reliable record keeping for that area only dates back to 1971)

Via Mother Jones-

http://www.motherjon...pacific-el-nino

[still learning]

NOAA has reported that May's global average land-sea surface temperature is the highest recorded.  See http://www.ncdc.noaa...c/global/2014/5

[Shortpoet-GTD]

The oil giants can quote "Wild Bill" Wharton from the Green Mile-
"They're cooking em' now."

[Shortpoet-GTD]

Scientist's are still monitoring the possibility of an El Nino this year; the research is ongoing.

Good article from Climate Central-
http://www.climatece...r-el-nino-17590

[Dustoffer]

For us, it means more needed rain in the mountains, but NOT NEEDED hail storms included.
El Nino is ‘already here’

  Australian climatologist claims the weather is already in the grip of the phenomenon.


Steff Gaulter  Last updated: 15 Jun 2014   

Australia prepares for drought conditions as the effects of El Nino start to affect the country [EPA]
"For the last few months, climatologists around the world have been warning that El Nino conditions may soon emerge, and now a Professor from the University of Southern Queensland says that the phenomenon is already with us.

El Nino is the slight warming of the waters of the Pacific Ocean. Although it sounds insignificant, it can have a devastating impact on the weather around the world. Details of the phenomenon can be found here.
Climatologist Roger Stone told Australia's ABC News, "The sea temperatures are already 1 or 2 degrees above normal, and right along the South American coast, perhaps 2 or 3 degrees above normal.
"That's the tell-tale sign of an early stage to an El Nino event."
http://www.aljazeera...5250418750.html

[Shortpoet-GTD]

Update-
still waiting.
http://www.climatece...continues-17752

[Shortpoet-GTD]

Halong, Genevieve, Iselle, Julio and Bertha.
Is El Nino here,
coming
or are these storms not proof of anything?
(My question not Climate Central's)

Maybe? (Scroll down a bit for piece on El Nino)
http://www.climatece...ic-storms-17879

No way-
http://www.climatece...y-arrives-17512

[Dustoffer]

Global warming is moistening the atmosphere

Posted on 13 August 2014 by John Abraham

"We have long suspected that greenhouse gases which cause the Earth to warm would lead to a wetter atmosphere. The latest research published by Eul-Seok Chung, Brian Soden, and colleagues provides new insight into what was thought to be an old problem. In doing so, they experimentally verified what climate models have been predicting. The models got it right… again.
To be clear, this paper does not prove that water vapor is a greenhouse gas. We have known that for years. Nevertheless, the paper make a very nice contribution. The authors show that the long-term increase in water vapor in the upper troposphere cannot have resulted from natural causes – it is clearly human caused. This conclusion is stated in the abstract,

Our analysis demonstrates that the upper-tropospheric moistening observed over the period 1979–2005 cannot be explained by natural causes and results principally from an anthropogenic warming of the climate. By attributing the observed increase directly to human activities, this study verifies the presence of the largest known feedback mechanism for amplifying anthropogenic climate change.

As stated earlier, climate models have predicted this moistening"
http://www.skeptical...atmosphere.html

Here I thought methane in total turnover would be the biggest upward temperature driver, followed by breakdown into massive amounts of CO2 and water vapor.  This heat increase, with even half the methane released, is enough to boil the oceans into thick clouds.  Heat travels down to deeper deposits and more heat until a Venus type planet without a biosphere.  Probably half the temperature and much less acid.
In percentage, at the end, water vapor will be the biggest heat trapper.  Then the atmosphere could get blown away by a coronal mass discharge, or make it until the Sun goes nova and Earth is at the edge of the red sun's surface.  Absorbed in the shrinking to eventual black dwarf, and, perhaps,  eventually absorbed into another solar system formation.

[Shortpoet-GTD]

We do seem a bit moist, as of late.

 flooded sts..jpg   8.05K   0 downloads

http://www.weather.c...-flood-20140813

(From out climate/weather thread))
http://www.altenergy...s/page__st__600

[still learning]

Dustoffer, on 14 August 2014 - 11:43 AM, said:

............In percentage, at the end, water vapor will be the biggest heat trapper.........  

   Water vapor is the biggest heat trapper now.  Will be in the future too.  Basic climate science stuff. Water vapor, molecule for molecule is actually a more potent infra-red absorber gas (or greenhouse gas) than carbon dioxide is.  Luckily, unlike for CO2, water vapor readily saturates the atmosphere, so you tend to get clouds and then rain as the amount of water vapor increases, thereby lowering the water vapor content back down.  Doesn't keep accumulating as is the case with CO2.  The Skeptical Science website that your linked article is at has a little bit of an explanation here: http://www.skeptical...enhouse-gas.htm    As atmospheric temperature increases (because of increased CO2), the water vapor saturation temperature increases too, so the atmosphere can hold more water vapor than before.  More greenhouse gas, more warming.  More evaporation from oceans.  More water vapor.  Luckily, still get saturation, just at a higher temperature.  Also luckily, each added increment if greenhouse gas, water vapor or CO2 or anything else, is a little less effective than the preceding increment. Your linked piece at Skeptical Science is a sort of review of a PNAS journal paper (see  http://www.pnas.org/...1.full.pdf html  ) that basically confirms yet another way that the major climate change models correctly explain the basics of today's climate and can be expected to have it right about what to expect in the not too distant future: global warming.

[still learning]

Ocean temperatures going up again, warming hiatus may be over, per University of Hawaii.  See EurekAlert piece here:  http://www.eurekaler...h-woe111314.php

[still learning]

Shortpoet-GTD, on 10 June 2014 - 03:54 PM, said:

NOAA is saying ..... 2014 is being on track to be the hottest year yet.

That was written last June.  NOAA has just posted "US climate highlights: 2014," says that Alaska, California, Nevada and Arizona all just had the warmest year on record.  See http://www.ncdc.noaa...ational/2014/12

[Shortpoet-GTD]

still learning, on 09 January 2015 - 07:45 PM, said:

That was written last June.  NOAA has just posted "US climate highlights: 2014," says that Alaska, California, Nevada and Arizona all just had the warmest year on record.  See http://www.ncdc.noaa...ational/2014/12

And your point is?

[still learning]

Shortpoet-GTD, on 11 January 2015 - 04:58 AM, said:

And your point is?

  Only that what you included about hottest year (  "2014 is being on track to be the hottest year yet" ) was at least partially true, true for some US states.  More recently NASA and NOAA have said that 2014 was hottest of all, worldwide average.  Some particular areas like the eastern US did run counter to the trend, but warmer than ever, worldwide total.  So that bit in the original post was true, planet total.    See  http://www.eurekaler...c-nnf011615.php  or  http://www.columbia....erature2014.pdf   Only a little hotter.  Add up A few dozen more "only a little hotter" bits though and eventually it'll get uncomfortable lots of places.  Not everywhere.  Siberia might do OK.

[Shortpoet-GTD]

2015? Maybe.
http://www.cpc.ncep....y/ensodisc.html

[Shortpoet-GTD]

It didn't happen in 2014; but maybe this year?
(Scroll down about 1/2 way into the article)
"It’s May, and there are compelling signs that a significant  El Niño event is in the works."

Via Weather West-
http://www.weatherwe...m/archives/3124

[Shortpoet-GTD]

Update-
Now they're saying there is a "substantial" chance El Nino will happen later this year.
(As if we're not having enough extreme weather events; this could (will) lead to even more extremes)- Oy Vey

Via BBC news-
http://www.bbc.com/n...onment-32704506