'Bundle Up, It's Global Warming'

Tabnabs

A nice piece in the NYT that goes some way to explain our recent cold spells.

THE earth continues to get warmer, yet it’s feeling a lot colder outside. Over the past few weeks, subzero temperatures in Poland claimed 66 lives; snow arrived in Seattle well before the winter solstice, and fell heavily enough in Minneapolis to make the roof of the Metrodome collapse; and last week blizzards closed Europe’s busiest airports in London and Frankfurt for days, stranding holiday travelers. The snow and record cold have invaded the Eastern United States, with more bad weather predicted.

All of this cold was met with perfect comic timing by the release of a World Meteorological Organization report showing that 2010 will probably be among the three warmest years on record, and 2001 through 2010 the warmest decade on record.

How can we reconcile this? The not-so-obvious short answer is that the overall warming of the atmosphere is actually creating cold-weather extremes. Last winter, too, was exceptionally snowy and cold across the Eastern United States and Eurasia, as were seven of the previous nine winters.

For a more detailed explanation, we must turn our attention to the snow in Siberia.

Annual cycles like El Niño/Southern Oscillation, solar variability and global ocean currents cannot account for recent winter cooling. And though it is well documented that the earth’s frozen areas are in retreat, evidence of thinning Arctic sea ice does not explain why the world’s major cities are having colder winters.

But one phenomenon that may be significant is the way in which seasonal snow cover has continued to increase even as other frozen areas are shrinking. In the past two decades, snow cover has expanded across the high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, especially in Siberia, just north of a series of exceptionally high mountain ranges, including the Himalayas, the Tien Shan and the Altai.

The high topography of Asia influences the atmosphere in profound ways. The jet stream, a river of fast-flowing air five to seven miles above sea level, bends around Asia’s mountains in a wavelike pattern, much as water in a stream flows around a rock or boulder. The energy from these atmospheric waves, like the energy from a sound wave, propagates both horizontally and vertically.

As global temperatures have warmed and as Arctic sea ice has melted over the past two and a half decades, more moisture has become available to fall as snow over the continents. So the snow cover across Siberia in the fall has steadily increased.

The sun’s energy reflects off the bright white snow and escapes back out to space. As a result, the temperature cools. When snow cover is more abundant in Siberia, it creates an unusually large dome of cold air next to the mountains, and this amplifies the standing waves in the atmosphere, just as a bigger rock in a stream increases the size of the waves of water flowing by.

The increased wave energy in the air spreads both horizontally, around the Northern Hemisphere, and vertically, up into the stratosphere and down toward the earth’s surface. In response, the jet stream, instead of flowing predominantly west to east as usual, meanders more north and south. In winter, this change in flow sends warm air north from the subtropical oceans into Alaska and Greenland, but it also pushes cold air south from the Arctic on the east side of the Rockies. Meanwhile, across Eurasia, cold air from Siberia spills south into East Asia and even southwestward into Europe.

That is why the Eastern United States, Northern Europe and East Asia have experienced extraordinarily snowy and cold winters since the turn of this century. Most forecasts have failed to predict these colder winters, however, because the primary drivers in their models are the oceans, which have been warming even as winters have grown chillier. They have ignored the snow in Siberia.

Last week, the British government asked its chief science adviser for an explanation. My advice to him is to look to the east.

It’s all a snow job by nature. The reality is, we’re freezing not in spite of climate change but because of it.

Judah Cohen is the director of seasonal forecasting at an atmospheric and environmental research firm.

source

thetonynator

They'll come up with anything to try convince us these days . .

rccaulfield

Good post, alot of low brow comments about global warming around this winter!

isle of man

But if any of that is true,
then with more snow on the ground, and more light reflected it will cool the earth over time,
and the old cycle will start again

Kippure

No comment.

catbear

I think green taxes should bee called theory taxes!

Danno

Lads, they all are wrong. The only reason we are getting colder winters now is because Gormley got into power and slapped carbon tax on everything we burn.

You see, Mother Nature is like the IMF... if we are good little peasents and pay our carbon tax, then she'll stop turning up the heat.

The closer petrol gets to €2 per litre and Kerosene to €1 per litre the more we shiver it seems. Of course we have to put up and shut up because it's for our own good.

thetonynator

thetonynator wrote: »

They'll come up with anything to try convince us these days . .

Indeed.
Theres one major flaw in the article..
Artic sea ICE is expanding at a rate of knots...

rccaulfield

catbear wrote: »

I think green taxes should bee called theory taxes!

Yea that theory of gravity or evolution is only a theory, theres a bunch of crackpots left against global warming at this stage, theres some great minds, neutrally motivated great minds coming up with the data.

M.T. Cranium

Just when we can explain one weather pattern, a new one shows up.

Who's winning the joke contest now, me or the last guy? :cool:

TheUsual

What annoy's me is comments like worst snow in 25 years or worst rainfall in 100 years.
So if you lived 25 years ago or 100 years ago you would have seen these events. It's just that young people (in general) have not seen snow before at Christmas and make a big deal out of it.
Add the internet and digital cameras all around the world and you would think we are living in exceptional times ... or maybe people are so bored with modern life that they wish we were living in exceptional times when we are not.

And I get the theory that global warming means more energy in the planet's weather systems - more extremes of hot and cold. However I don't see why every cold snap or hottest summer in 30 years becomes the end of the world or a permanent change to the enviroment.

homersimpson

An interesting article on this topic can be read here:

http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/reportcard/atmosphere.html

dsmythy

So is our planet trying to fix itself?

Pete M.

dsmythy wrote: »

So is our planet trying to fix itself?

If one subscribes to the Gaia theory, then they may argue yes.

Rabble Rabble

So :

1) was any of this predicted in the models? They were predicting warmer northern hemisphere winters until 2 years ago.

2) how can colder winters over the northern hemisphere not act as a feedback mechanism to cool the planet - invalidating models.

As for the 3rd warmest on record. It was an El Nino year, and a big one.

Rabble Rabble

TheUsual wrote: »

What annoy's me is comments like worst snow in 25 years or worst rainfall in 100 years.
So if you lived 25 years ago or 100 years ago you would have seen these events. It's just that young poeple (in general) have not seen snow before at Christmas and make a big deal out of it.
Add the internet and digital cameras all around the world and you would think we are living in exceptional times ... or maybe people are so bored with modern life that they wish we were living in exceptional times when we are not.

And I get the theory that global warming means more energy in the planet's weather systems - more extremes of hot and cold. However I don't see why every cold snap of hottest summer in 30 years becomes the end of the world or a permanent change to the enviroment.

We are: this has been the coldest Dec. since records bagan in Ireland. Although the last few days may have scuppered that. Late November to Dec 25th was the coldest since records began in England. Records began in 1650.

syklops

rccaulfield wrote: »

Yea that theory of gravity or evolution is only a theory, theres a bunch of crackpots left against global warming at this stage, theres some great minds, neutrally motivated great minds coming up with the data.

Is it really the act of a crack pot to look at the environment in its current state and ask ones self, is the world really getting warmer??

Usersname

Danno wrote: »

the IMF

Well done folks, we managed to get to the 7th post this time before someone mentioned the IMF/recession.

Godge

The problem with the quoted newspaper articles and others like it is not that it may be wrong. It is that the scientists who are predicting global warming did not predict the type of weather we are now seeing. The question then arises, if they did not understand the world's climate well enough to take into account the effect of a snow-covered Siberia, do they understand it well enough to be sure that the increased carbon dioxide emissions (which I do not doubt) will inevitably lead to a warmer climate.

You must remember that when the hole in the ozone layer started to expand, we were told we would all be forced to live indoors by 2010. A small change in the use of CFCs is supposed to have halted the expansion of the hole.

Usersname

TheUsual wrote: »

However I don't see why every cold snap of hottest summer in 30 years becomes the end of the world or a permanent change to the enviroment.

I understand your point, and might agree to a certain extent. This, however, is obviously not any old 'cold snap'.

Last year was unusually cold/icy. This year even more so along with North America and Asia. What if next year is even worse/the same? My guess is you will still be on boards denying climate change and will continue to do so until we are all under 30 feet of water :P

Rabble Rabble

Usersname wrote: »

I understand your point, and might agree to a certain extent. This, however, is obviously not any old 'cold snap'.

Last year was unusually cold/icy. This year even more so along with North America and Asia. What if next year is even worse/the same? My guess is you will still be on boards denying climate change and will continue to do so until we are all under 30 feet of water :P

The warmists predicted the exact opposite for northern hemisphere winters.

Usersname

Rabble Rabble wrote: »

The warmists predicted the exact opposite for northern hemisphere winters.

And your point is? Read my post again. I stated two facts and then gave a hypothetical. So why are you telling me what was predicted by 'warmists'? Are you trying to explain the unlikelihood of said hypothetical? Because if so, not only have you completely failed to grasp my point you have also failed to understand the concept of a 'what if' scenario.

sh1tstirrer

Usersname wrote: »

I understand your point, and might agree to a certain extent. This, however, is obviously not any old 'cold snap'.

Last year was unusually cold/icy. This year even more so along with North America and Asia. What if next year is even worse/the same? My guess is you will still be on boards denying climate change and will continue to do so until we are all under 30 feet of water :P

If you think the last two winters are unusual, you obviously weren't around back in the 60's and 70's when we had severe winters.

Usersname

sh1tstirrer wrote: »

If you think the last two winters are unusual, you obviously weren't around back in the 60's and 70's when we had severe winters.

What if next year is even worse than the 60's and 70's? My guess is you will still be on boards denying climate change and will continue to do so until we are all under 30 feet of water

Rabble Rabble

Usersname wrote: »

What if next year is even worse than the 60's and 70's? My guess is you will still be on boards denying climate change and will continue to do so until we are all under 30 feet of water

??. Seriously do you think the recent cold winters are symptomatic of global warming, or not? You seem to be framing your accusations in "hypotheticals" about what other posters would do were we under 30 feet of water.

So what do you think. Will you still be on boards agreeing with global warming when the entire northern hemisphere is under ice every winter?

rccaulfield

2010 was the warmest year on record for this planet, this is the warmest decade on record for those just browsing.

Usersname

Rabble Rabble wrote: »

??. Seriously do you think the recent cold winters are symptomatic of global warming, or not? You seem to be framing your accusations in "hypotheticals" about what other posters would do were we under 30 feet of water.

What accusations? I have not said a thing about what other posters would do 'were we' under 30 feet of water. I think you need to slow down and actually read my posts Rabble, instead of just replying and using key phrases from my posts to construct a meaning of your own invention.

Rabble Rabble wrote: »

So what do you think. Will you still be on boards agreeing with global warming when the entire northern hemisphere is under ice every winter?

You see, here's the thing about a hypothetical, it has to actually make some sort of sense or have at least a vague possibility of occurring in order to warrant a response.

Speaking of responding, I won't be doing any of that until one of your posts actually make sense.

4gun

rccaulfield wrote: »

2010 was the warmest year on record for this planet, this is the warmest decade on record for those just browsing.

not from where I live... had plenty of sun but temp did not got above low twenties...
may was so cold and dry that half the lawn seed that i planted at the end of april did not germinate untill mid august

Kippure

"Global warming is a fictional ghost that man has nothing to do with"
sums it up really for me.

Usersname

Kippure wrote: »

"Global warming is a fictional ghost that man has nothing to do with"
sums it up really for me.

"Ignorance is bliss"
sums your post up really for me

isle of man

rccaulfield wrote: »

2010 was the warmest year on record for this planet, this is the warmest decade on record for those just browsing.

dec totals have not been imported into the models yet,
and theres plenty on these boards that have shown the nasa/giss models to have cherry picked there results