Global Warming

[TheGreatOne]

Both NASA and the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration have rated January to June as the warmest period in recorded history.  This June was the warmest since record keeping began in 1880, according to the National Climate Data Center, marking the globes 4 consecutive warmest month in history(1).  Additionally NASAs Goddard Institute has rated this June the third Warmest June in history, just behind 1998 and 2009 (2).  The University of Alabama has also recorded some of the lowest Oceanic and atmospheric temperatures in human history, finding the second highest temperatures on record.  Record Temperatures have been broken along the East Coast of the United States, Southeast Asia, large portions of the Sahara, and the Middle East.  

Moreover, the Artic Sea Ice Extent is at its lowest in our 31 years of Satelite Imagery, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center.  This June, the ice melted 50% faster than normal, because a strong high pressure drove all that hot air from East Asia into the Artic region.

Do what you want with this information.

1)http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/?report=global&year=2010&month=6&submitted=Get+Report
3)http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt
2)http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/t2lt/uahncdc.lt
4)http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/index.html

[Lief 🗽]

I think it's funny (but also depressing I guess), that when it was snowing so much earlier in the year, all the conservatives and Fox News and everyone were laughing it up how the snow outside disproves global warming. And then suddenly this summer there are record nation-wide heatwaves and everyone ignores it. And then next winter they'll laugh about how stupid Al Gore is again when it snows.

[k-onmmunist]

I'm not a conservative and I believe global warming is natural.

[fezzyfestoon]

I think it's funny (but also depressing I guess), that when it was snowing so much earlier in the year, all the conservatives and Fox News and everyone were laughing it up how the snow outside disproves global warming. And then suddenly this summer there are record nation-wide heatwaves and everyone ignores it. And then next winter they'll laugh about how stupid Al Gore is again when it snows.

Uh...no.  The morons on the other side go on and on about how warm weather means Global Warming.  Both sides are clueless hacks.

[Beet]

The arc of conservative argument will be/has been the following:

[1] Global warming is a myth. The earth isn't warming. It's cooling.
[2] The earth may be warming, but it's caused by sunspots. It'll reverse itself next year.
[3] Global warming is inevitable. Humans have nothing to do with it.
[4] Global warming is a good thing. It benefits Siberia and Greenland, QED.
[5] We've been warning about the dangers of global warming all along. We never argued against it.

[Franzl]

I think it's funny (but also depressing I guess), that when it was snowing so much earlier in the year, all the conservatives and Fox News and everyone were laughing it up how the snow outside disproves global warming. And then suddenly this summer there are record nation-wide heatwaves and everyone ignores it. And then next winter they'll laugh about how stupid Al Gore is again when it snows.

Uh...no.  The morons on the other side go on and on about how warm weather means Global Warming.  Both sides are clueless hacks.

^^^^^^^^^^

[J. J.]

I think it's funny (but also depressing I guess), that when it was snowing so much earlier in the year, all the conservatives and Fox News and everyone were laughing it up how the snow outside disproves global warming. And then suddenly this summer there are record nation-wide heatwaves and everyone ignores it. And then next winter they'll laugh about how stupid Al Gore is again when it snows.

We've had enough people here talking the "the warmest summer" on record, to see both sides.

That said, I do believe that has been a warming trend.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

I think it's funny (but also depressing I guess), that when it was snowing so much earlier in the year, all the conservatives and Fox News and everyone were laughing it up how the snow outside disproves global warming. And then suddenly this summer there are record nation-wide heatwaves and everyone ignores it. And then next winter they'll laugh about how stupid Al Gore is again when it snows.

Neither of those prove nor disprove global warming.

[Ban my account ffs!]

The high pressure didn't drive warm air into the Arctic.  It simply drove the ice out of the Arctic.  The high Arctic was a little below normal temperature wise during June:



Of course the graph is misleading because temperatures in the summer in the Arctic are very constant and almost the same every year.  This is because the air is relatively warm and humid and it takes a lot more energy to heat it up more there.  During winter when it is dark and the air is extremely cold and dry, it doesn't take much energy to warm the Arctic by huge amounts.

Also not posted in the original post, mostly because it focuses on June, is the rather dramatic turnaround in sea ice loss from a very fast pace to a very slow pace in the past couple weeks:



One thing that is uncertain, but is noteworthy is that the forecast models are beginning to indicate a rapid and dramatic cooling of the globe in the coming months.  Some models are indicating that the global average temperature for this winter could be below average with the coldest global temperatures since 1996.

While it may not appear to be that significant (alas.. 1996 was only 14 years ago), it would mark the first time since 1973 that the cool down following an El Niño was stronger than the warm up caused by the El Niño, thus cooling global temperatures overall.



This is from the Japanese government's long range forecast model for December-February 2010/11.  They predict cold will dominate over Australia, the vast majority of Africa and Eurasia, and the northwestern half of North America as well as the Amazon.  The only truly notable warm area will be across the southern and central Plains, the southeast, and the mid Atlantic of the United States.

This pattern of the cold PDO which supports cold water along the west coast of North America and the predicted moderate to strong La Niña which means large amounts of very cold water pooled across the equatorial Pacific, pulls the jet stream southwestward across the western U.S. and supports a strong ridge over the eastern U.S.  Even though the tropics will be cooler than normal, that air is still much warmer than what is normal for the eastern part of the U.S. as it is driven northeastward in a strong southwesterly wind.

These are the types of winters where Arctic air can back down into the northwest coastal areas and drop huge amounts of snow and freezing rain on Seattle and Portland.  Meanwhile people in DC will probably be basking in relative warmth.  But they will likely be the only place on earth to really feel any kind of warmth, at least relatively speaking.

[TheGreatOne]

I think it's funny (but also depressing I guess), that when it was snowing so much earlier in the year, all the conservatives and Fox News and everyone were laughing it up how the snow outside disproves global warming. And then suddenly this summer there are record nation-wide heatwaves and everyone ignores it. And then next winter they'll laugh about how stupid Al Gore is again when it snows.

It was actually a warm winter around the globe.  Just because the East Coast has cold weather doesn't mean the West Coast or other continents have cold weather.  It was one of the warmest Januarys on record, but most people can only see what's in front of their noses.  The planet is over.  Its not a debate.  I spoke to a friend that works for NASA, and he said that there hasn't been a major change in sun activity over the past 50 years.  The argument is bunk, considering the amount of change temperatures were seeing in the last 20 years.  However, I don't think the Democrats will be able to convince the American people that the cause is CO2.  If it can't be demonstrated with pictures, the public won't buy it.

[Ban my account ffs!]

This is the surface air temperature anomalies from Dec. 1 2009 to Mar. 1 2010.

This is indicative of an extremely negative Arctic and North Atlantic Oscillation with all the warmth up in northern Canada and Greenland and across northern Africa with all the cold in Europe and Russia and across the south and eastern U.S.



The cool air southwest of Alaska with a stream of warmth up into the Pac NW is indicative of a positive Pacific Decadal Oscillation which is common during El Niño... even though the index stayed neutral (since the PDO is determined both with air pressure and water temps.. the water temps indicated negative PDO while the air pressure indicated positive).

Basically, warm air is pumped northeastward from the tropics into the western U.S., Alaska, and Canada.  

The southwest and especially western Mexico are often cooler than normal during an El Niño even while the northwest is very warm because despite the warmth off of the coast of Mexico, in the tropics, and up the west coast of the U.S., the jet stream is displaced further south than normal, is much stronger, flatter (more zonal), and has much more moisture to work with than normal.  This keeps storm after storm hitting those areas.  Storms can "create" cold air themselves since they are cold core winter storms and often keep those regions cool and wet.  These storms are pulling in air from the north that while it is warmer than normal for those areas, is still cooler than normal in the southern areas.

For example, a normal winter day in Boise might be somewhere around 30˚F while Phoenix might normally see 70˚F.  During El Niño with all the storminess displaced to the south, Boise might see 45˚F.. but that air is also pulled south towards Phoenix and they might see a high of 55 to 60˚F.

The opposite occurs during La Niña.  Boise might be in the throes of Arctic air at 0˚F while a ridge of high pressure warms Phoenix up to near 90˚F.

The winter of 1988/89 is a great example of the almost exact opposite pattern compared to 2009/10.  It was just as extreme in the opposite direction. (Keep in mind, both have been blamed on global warming by the same people).



Notice here that the water southwest of Alaska is warm with a stream of cold air flowing from the western U.S. into the tropics.  This is caused by the cold water there pulling the jet stream southwestward.

The warmth in western Canada and extreme cold in eastern Canada is not a signal of the La Niña, but of the extremely positive phase of the Arctic and North Atlantic Oscillations that winter.  It greatly increased the west winds across Canada keeping cold air from maturing in western Canada, and instead driving it into northeastern Canada and Greenland.

The combination of a strong La Niña and a positive AO/NAO pulls the jet stream much further north than normal over the eastern U.S., Atlantic Ocean, and Europe keeping most areas there milder than normal while the cold is bottled up in the Arctic.

Below is a more typical La Niña signal without the strong effect of the AO/NAO:

1973/74


Here you see the cold more widespread across central and western Canada and along the west coast.  This connection pulls the cold polar air from northern Canada and the Arctic in a northeast-southwestwardly flow towards the colder than normal tropical Pacific.

That is a classic signal of the negative Pacific-North American pattern which is strongly correlated with La Niña.

During the opposite phase with El Niño and a positive PNA, what is known as the Cahir's connection forms, opening a channel of free flowing air from the depths of Siberia across the pole and straight down into the southeastern U.S.  This is where the most famous Arctic outbreaks form since Siberia is actually the coldest place in the northern hemisphere.

During the La Niña years, the source region of most of the Arctic air is from the high Arctic and northern Canada which, while it can be extremely cold, doesn't have the strength to penetrate as far south.. so the areas that can support cold.. mainly those with heavy snowcover and are protected from wind, will get extremely cold but areas with less snowcover and more wind, like the Plains... can see quick moderations in temperatures and thus end up slightly above normal for the winter with large swings back and forth.

[Derek]

Do you believe everything democrats tell you about global warming? I thought you had this under another topic anyhow?

[TheGreatOne]

Do you believe everything democrats tell you about global warming? I thought you had this under another topic anyhow?

No, but the globe is warming.  That's a fact.  A rational person can not take the position that the Earth's temperatures are stagnant or cooling.  They are lying to you.  Whether or not you beleive its man-made or natural global warming is a different story.  It could be both.  I just don't beleive we can't continue to think that our actions on this planet have no consequences to our environment.   

[opebo]

Not a high priority, in my book.  I mean, sure, we're all drowing in our own s**t, but meanwhile a few of us are standing on the others heads.