Occasional Thoughts on Climate Change

[csnavywx]

The same people who top-called Antarctica 8 years ago are now pivoting to top calling the Arctic now.

I look forward to your weenie tag tears.

Keep short selling that temp graph and keep getting your face ripped off.

 

[TheClimateChanger]

This might be an unusual post, but does it seem like there is a perception problem when it comes to climate? Like people just accept the change, and then suddenly use that as the benchmark for what's a normal climate for a region.

Like I feel that people think of Cleveland as this cold and snowy place, but the actual data would show over the last 10 years that the mean monthly and annual temperatures are on par with late 20th century northern/central Kentucky. Or Pittsburgh, where the mean annual and monthly temperature closely matches that of suburban Washington, D.C. metro or southern West Virginia, but inside the city, probably more on par with the lower elevations of eastern Tennessee or northwest Virginia.

[TheClimateChanger]

Cleveland (May 2015 - April 2024)

KCLE:

KBKL [Burke Lakefront Airport]:

Covington, KY (1956-1985)

Lexington, KY (1956-1985)

 

 

 

[Typhoon Tip]

moderate shower here...

[Typhoon Tip]

1 hour ago, LibertyBell said:

we are now building wind farms that will power millions of homes though.  I think wind is the future of energy for us and it will happen quicker than many think.

The long island wind farm project is quite extensive!

 

imagine the power that could be generated if turbines were forced by tides... 

wouldn't have to worry about whether the wind is blowing or the sun is shining...  celestial mechanics --> tide cycle is always on, period.

[TheClimateChanger]

Pittsburgh (May 2015 - April 2024)

KPIT:

KAGC:

What's interesting is the city station used to run 2.6F warmer than KPIT and about 2.0F warmer than AGC owing to the much lower elevation and heat island effect, which, in either case, would imply the downtown city temperature over this interval is now around 56.0F.

Sterling, VA (suburban Washington metro) [1962-1985]

Roanoke, VA (1956-1985)

Tri-Cities, TN (1956-1985)

 

[bdgwx]

On 4/22/2024 at 9:49 AM, ChescoWx said:

the year experts predicted it would be “ice-free” by the summer of 2013

"Experts" did not predict the Arctic would be "ice-free" (< 1e6 km2) by the summer of 2013. The most aggressive prediction I've seen using a broad based consilience of evidence approach so far is from the IPCC AR6 report in which they say "The Arctic is likely to be practically sea ice-free in September at least once before 2050." This is a significant downward revision from their 2070 target in the early 2000's and 2100 target in the 1990's. It is important to point out that the IPCC has a poor track record of Arctic sea ice declines. For example, in 2001 they said annual mean Arctic sea ice extent would not drop below 10.5e6 km2 until 2040. It first happened in 2007 followed by 2011, 2012, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2023. And this is systematic of scientific community in general. Scientists have woefully underestimated Arctic sea ice decline.

BTW...the only "expert" I know of that gave an early prediction was Peter Wadhams in a The Guardian article from 2013. His prediction was immediately criticized by the scientific community as not being supported by the evidence. It's also strange that Wadhams' own research at the time only stated within the next 30 years [Wadhams 2012] so it's not clear to me how this discrepancy gets resolved. Did he actually say what The Guardian said he said? If he did then why did he give a prediction to The Guardian that contradicts his prediction given in his own peer reviewed publications? 

[LibertyBell]

4 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

imagine the power that could be generated if turbines were forced by tides... 

wouldn't have to worry about whether the wind is blowing or the sun is shining...  celestial mechanics --> tide cycle is always on, period.

Yes John!  I read that the tides have the power to provide energy for two earths, not just the one we have!

Gravitational energy-- there is no greater force in the entire universe!

It's the ultimate underdog story-- the weakest of the four fundamental forces built the entire universe!

Think about the possibilities of creating micro black holes and how much energy we could harvest from those!

 

[TheClimateChanger]

So, to me, this data would suggest that a place like Cleveland or Toledo has a climate like that of mid- to late 20th century northern and central Kentucky, over the past 10 years. Suburban Pittsburgh looks on par with suburban Washington, D.C. or Charleston, WV, while the city itself is more on par with southwest Virginia or far northeast Tennesee [lower elevation locales, not looking at mountain climates].

In light of the ongoing trend (even an apparent acceleration), I would anticipate Cleveland/Toledo will look like southern Kentucky by 2040, and suburban Pittsburgh will look like northeast Tennessee, while the city itself has a climate more on par with 20th century middle North Carolina.

[LibertyBell]

13 minutes ago, TheClimateChanger said:

This might be an unusual post, but does it seem like there is a perception problem when it comes to climate? Like people just accept the change, and then suddenly use that as the benchmark for what's a normal climate for a region.

Like I feel that people think of Cleveland as this cold and snowy place, but the actual data would show over the last 10 years that the mean monthly and annual temperatures are on par with late 20th century northern/central Kentucky. Or Pittsburgh, where the mean annual and monthly temperature closely matches that of suburban Washington, D.C. metro or southern West Virginia, but inside the city, probably more on par with the lower elevations of eastern Tennessee or northwest Virginia.

blame 30 year normals for that

they should use the entire climate history of a region to make those calculations

 

[LibertyBell]

10 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

moderate shower here...

that was this morning now the sun is out

[bluewave]

14 minutes ago, bdgwx said:

"Experts" did not predict the Arctic would be "ice-free" (< 1e6 km2) by the summer of 2013. The most aggressive prediction I've seen using a broad based consilience of evidence approach so far is from the IPCC AR6 report in which they say "The Arctic is likely to be practically sea ice-free in September at least once before 2050." This is a significant downward revision from their 2070 target in the early 2000's and 2100 target in the 1990's. It is important to point out that the IPCC has a poor track record of Arctic sea ice declines. For example, in 2001 they said annual mean Arctic sea ice extent would not drop below 10.5e6 km2 until 2040. It first happened in 2007 followed by 2011, 2012, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2023. And this is systematic of scientific community in general. Scientists have woefully underestimated Arctic sea ice decline.

BTW...the only "expert" I know of that gave an early prediction was Peter Wadhams in a The Guardian article from 2013. His prediction was immediately criticized by the scientific community as not being supported by the evidence. It's also strange that Wadhams' own research at the time only stated within the next 30 years [Wadhams 2012] so it's not clear to me how this discrepancy gets resolved. Did he actually say what The Guardian said he said? If he did then why did he give a prediction to The Guardian that contradicts his prediction given in his own peer reviewed publications? 

Extent has been changing more slowly now that most of the older multiyear sea ice is gone. The 2007 season marked a fundamental shift in Arctic sea ice to this new state. No matter what summer conditions have occurred since then, we have not been able to get close to pre-2007 ice in thickness or extent. So it will probably turn out to be a bigger turning point in the history of the Arctic than the first technically ice free season under 1 million square km.
 

https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/with-thick-ice-gone-arctic-sea-ice-changes-more-slowly

The Arctic Ocean's sea ice blanket has already lost most of its old ice and two-thirds of its thickness. The younger ice is thinning more slowly and variably.

The Arctic Ocean's blanket of sea ice has changed since 1958 from predominantly older, thicker ice to mostly younger, thinner ice, according to new research published by NASA scientist Ron Kwok of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California. With so little thick, old ice left, the rate of decrease in ice thickness has slowed. New ice grows faster but is more vulnerable to weather and wind, so ice thickness is now more variable, rather than dominated by the effect of global warming.

 

Working from a combination of satellite records and declassified submarine sonar data, NASA scientists have constructed a 60-year record of Arctic sea ice thickness. Right now, Arctic sea ice is the youngest and thinnest its been since we started keeping records. More than 70 percent of Arctic sea ice is now seasonal, which means it grows in the winter and melts in the summer, but doesn't last from year to year. This seasonal ice melts faster and breaks up easier, making it much more susceptible to wind and atmospheric conditions.

Kwok's research, published today in the journal Environmental Research Letters, combined decades of declassified U.S. Navy submarine measurements with more recent data from four satellites to create the 60-year record of changes in Arctic sea ice thickness. He found that since 1958, Arctic ice cover has lost about two-thirds of its thickness, as averaged across the Arctic at the end of summer. Older ice has shrunk in area by almost 800,000 square miles (more than 2 million square kilometers). Today, 70 percent of the ice cover consists of ice that forms and melts within a single year, which scientists call seasonal ice.

Sea ice of any age is frozen ocean water. However, as sea ice survives through several melt seasons, its characteristics change. Multiyear ice is thicker, stronger and rougher than seasonal ice. It is much less salty than seasonal ice; Arctic explorers used it as drinking water. Satellite sensors observe enough of these differences that scientists can use spaceborne data to distinguish between the two types of ice.

Thinner, weaker seasonal ice is innately more vulnerable to weather than thick, multiyear ice. It can be pushed around more easily by wind, as happened in the summer of 2013. During that time, prevailing winds piled up the ice cover against coastlines, which made the ice cover thicker for months.

The ice's vulnerability may also be demonstrated by the increased variation in Arctic sea ice thickness and extent from year to year over the last decade. In the past, sea ice rarely melted in the Arctic Ocean. Each year, some multiyear ice flowed out of the ocean into the East Greenland Sea and melted there, and some ice grew thick enough to survive the melt season and become multiyear ice. As air temperatures in the polar regions have warmed in recent decades, however, large amounts of multiyear ice now melt within the Arctic Ocean itself. Far less seasonal ice now thickens enough over the winter to survive the summer. As a result, not only is there less ice overall, but the proportions of multiyear ice to seasonal ice have also changed in favor of the young ice.

Seasonal ice now grows to a depth of about six feet (two meters) in winter, and most of it melts in summer. That basic pattern is likely to continue, Kwok said. "The thickness and coverage in the Arctic are now dominated by the growth, melting and deformation of seasonal ice."

The increase in seasonal ice also means record-breaking changes in ice cover such as those of the 1990s and 2000s are likely to be less common, Kwok noted. In fact, there has not been a new record sea ice minimum since 2012, despite years of warm weather in the Arctic. "We've lost so much of the thick ice that changes in thickness are going to be slower due to the different behavior of this ice type," Kwok said.

Kwok used data from U.S. Navy submarine sonars from 1958 to 2000; satellite altimeters on NASA's ICESat and the European CryoSat-2, which span from 2003 to 2018; and scatterometer measurements from NASA's QuikSCAT and the European ASCAT from 1999 to 2017.

 

[LibertyBell]

Chris we notice this ourselves with snow too--- snow that has survived many thaw freeze cycles is much more difficult to melt than new snow, which melts much more quickly.  Older snow is much harder, denser and much more difficult to melt.

 

[TheClimateChanger]

30 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

blame 30 year normals for that

they should use the entire climate history of a region to make those calculations

 

I would probably compare only to years before 2000 and toss all the recent years. So many months now don't even crack the top 10 warmest, that would have been like 4th or 5th warmest on record just 20 years ago. That means the same months that would have been highlighted on the NWS website as being incredibly warm just a couple decades ago now don't even get a second glance and, in fact, people think those months are relatively mild because they compare it to the fact that, for instance, 5 of the most recent 12 years have been warmer. And it's those recent 12 years that people remember and base their expectations on.

This happens all the time now. So many months look like no big deals, when they would have been considered very warm just a couple decades ago.

[LibertyBell]

9 minutes ago, TheClimateChanger said:

I would probably compare only to years before 2000 and toss all the recent years. So many months now don't even crack the top 10 warmest, that would have been like 4th or 5th warmest on record just 20 years ago. That means the same months that would have been highlighted on the NWS website as being incredibly warm just a couple decades ago now don't even get a second glance and, in fact, people think those months are relatively mild because they compare it to the fact that, for instance, 5 of the most recent 12 years have been warmer. And it's those recent 12 years that people remember and base their expectations on.

This happens all the time now. So many months look like no big deals, when they would have been considered very warm just a couple decades ago.

This is why the whole idea of "average" is just an illusion.

Another example is the extreme increase in rainfall and earlier last freezes since 2000.

I grew up in the 80s and 90s and I distinctly remember our last freeze was around April 10th and we used to average around 40 inches of rain a year.  But now our last "average" freeze is considered to be March 30th and our "average" rainfall is now 50 inches of rain a year? How is this even allowed to happen? We really should end climate norms with 2000 and anything that occurred since then should be compared to what happened before.  

[TheClimateChanger]

6 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

This is why the whole illusion of average is just an illusion.

Another example is the extreme increase in rainfall and earlier last freezes since 2000.

I grew up in the 80s and 90s and I distinctly remember our last freeze was around April 10th and we used to average around 40 inches of rain a year.  But now our last "average" freeze is considered to be March 30th and our "average" rainfall is now 50 inches of rain a year? How is this even allowed to happen? We really should end climate norms with 2000 and anything that occurred since then should be compared to what happened before.  

We are living in the climate statistics equivalent of baseball's steroid era. Like 40 home runs used to be a pretty big deal, then you suddenly enter an era where someone like Brady Anderson goes from averaging 20-25 homers to knocking 50 out of the park. And three different players are routinely hitting 60-70 a season.

[LibertyBell]

5 minutes ago, TheClimateChanger said:

We are living in the climate statistics equivalent of baseball's steroid era. Like 40 home runs used to be a pretty big deal, then you suddenly enter an era where someone like Brady Anderson goes from averaging 20-25 homers to knocking 50 out of the park. And three different players are routinely hitting 60-70 a season.

and these players are not actually better than the players from the earlier era because everyone is hitting like that.  It's why normalizing this behavior isn't the right way to do things.

[GaWx]

 The major effects of CC to this point haven’t all been bad on a global basis. For example, fewer deaths from temperature extremes resulting from GW due to cold being a much bigger killer than heat. This is largely due to many more hours spent in the cold danger zone than within the heat danger zone in a large majority of locations:

“For the majority of the time, most cities have colder temperatures than their local optimum temperature, or the temperature that minimizes the death rate in that area.

 “It has been estimated that about 5.1 million excess deaths per year are associated with non-optimal temperatures. Of those, 4.6 million are associated with colder than optimum temperatures, and 0.5 million are associated with hotter than optimum temperatures.”
 

 “Deaths associated with non-optimal temperatures have been decreasing over time as it has gotten warmer partly due to a reduction in cold deaths. It has been estimated that warming from 2000 to 2019 has resulted in a net decline in excess deaths globally (a larger decrease in cold deaths than an increase in heat deaths).”

https://thebreakthrough.org/issues/energy/human-deaths-from-hot-and-cold-temperatures-and-implications-for-climate-change

 Whereas deaths from temperature extremes have decreased through 2019 per this study, the same study says that there’s much uncertainty looking well out into the future. A good number of models suggest that after deaths continue to drop in the near future, they will start to increase late this century. This is because heat related deaths are being projected by these models to then start increasing more rapidly than the reduction of cold related deaths. From the same study, here’s Figure 10, which shows London as an example:

 Of course due to that being so far out in the future, there’s lots of uncertainty since increased acclimation/air conditioning could negate a good portion of the projected increase in heat related deaths. 

[LibertyBell]

11 hours ago, GaWx said:

 The major effects of CC to this point haven’t all been bad on a global basis. For example, fewer deaths from temperature extremes resulting from GW due to cold being a much bigger killer than heat. This is largely due to many more hours spent in the cold danger zone than within the heat danger zone in a large majority of locations:

“For the majority of the time, most cities have colder temperatures than their local optimum temperature, or the temperature that minimizes the death rate in that area.

 “It has been estimated that about 5.1 million excess deaths per year are associated with non-optimal temperatures. Of those, 4.6 million are associated with colder than optimum temperatures, and 0.5 million are associated with hotter than optimum temperatures.”
 

 “Deaths associated with non-optimal temperatures have been decreasing over time as it has gotten warmer partly due to a reduction in cold deaths. It has been estimated that warming from 2000 to 2019 has resulted in a net decline in excess deaths globally (a larger decrease in cold deaths than an increase in heat deaths).”

https://thebreakthrough.org/issues/energy/human-deaths-from-hot-and-cold-temperatures-and-implications-for-climate-change

 Whereas deaths from temperature extremes have decreased through 2019 per this study, the same study says that there’s much uncertainty looking well out into the future. A good number of models suggest that after deaths continue to drop in the near future, they will start to increase late this century. This is because heat related deaths are being projected by these models to then start increasing more rapidly than the reduction of cold related deaths. From the same study, here’s Figure 10, which shows London as an example:

 Of course due to that being so far out in the future, there’s lots of uncertainty since increased acclimation/air conditioning could negate a good portion of the projected increase in heat related deaths. 

There's other factors associated with this-- for example excessive flooding, more forest fires and higher air pollution.

Add them all up together and you have billion dollar disaster that need to be paid for by lowlifes like Greenskeeper and his kind who don't understand science and the fossil fuel cartels trash like him worships.