WMAZ-Macon Meteorologist Matt Daniel summed it up this way,
The comment I dislike the most is when people talk about cold weather and people type “So much for global warming…” Not really a joke to me. Also, it proves someone doesn’t have the understanding of the definition of weather vs climate. You’ll see people type that a lot in the next week or two on professional meteorologists’ social media pages.
What we are seeing right now in the United States is just,………well……wait for it……”winter”…..Even as climate warms, we will always have winter (cold weather, snowstorms, blizzards). Winter is related to how the Earth is tilted on its axis as it moves around the Sun. In a previous Forbes piece, I described how the axial tilt of our planet determines our seasons.
Now having said that, our weather is governed by a series of undulations or wave patterns. The “valleys” (troughs) in those waves allow cold, dense air to ooze into the U.S. The “hills” (ridges) in the waves are typically associated with warm conditions. If you search Arctic Amplification on the Internet, there is some evidence that climate change is causing more wavy, high amplitude “valleys” and “hills” in the jet stream pattern. This could be associated with more extreme cold events and more extreme heat/drought events. The science is still emerging on this process, but it should be monitored and not dismissed.
Below, the video I produced for the Arctic Council after more than 2 years of interviewing a number of the world’s most highly respected Arctic experts, a 5 year summation of Snow,Water, Ice and Permafrost science – the first 4 minutes talk about the emerging science of how losing arctic ice is impacting temperate zone weather.
Not settled science yet, but general agreement that important effects exist, and they look a lot like what we are seeing this week.
Reblogged this on AGR Daily 60 Second News Bites.
Another good piece here: https://insideclimatenews.org/news/27092017/polar-vortex-cold-snap-arctic-ice-loss-global-warming-climate-change
Odd that, whenever we have a heatwave, “skeptics” like James Inhofe don’t say, “The scientists are right — there is global warming!”
Double standards? Oh, surely not!
Is this part 568 or 568a?
Meanwhile an interesting development
Microsoft “AI For Earth” Project Will Democratize Access To Climate Change Data
https://cleantechnica.com/2017/12/28/microsoft-ai-earth-project-will-democratize-access-climate-change-data/
Information is power. Until recently, information about the condition of the earth’s environment has been accessible only to a limited number of people — climate scientists, researchers, and government officials among them. On December 11 — the two-year anniversary of the Paris climate accords — Brad Smith, president and chief legal officer of Microsoft, announced his company will invest $50 million over the next 5 years to democratize access to the data available about the environment available from the thousands of land, sea, and atmospheric sensors in place around the world using AI or artificial intelligence.
“AI can be trained to classify raw data from sensors on the ground, in the sky, or in space into categories that both humans and computers understand,” Smith said. “Fundamentally, AI can accelerate our ability to observe environmental systems and how they are changing at a global scale, convert the data into useful information, and apply that information to take concrete steps to better manage our natural resources.”
“We face a collective need for urgent action to address global climate issues. When we think about the environmental issues we face today, science tells us that many are the product of previous Industrial Revolutions,” Smith said as part of the December 11 announcement. “We must not only move technology forward, but also use this era’s technology to clean up the past and create a better future.”
Democratizing access to information may provide a means of bypassing the climate trolls who insist climate change is a hoax dreamed up by China to embarrass the US. It could empower people to make up their own minds without resort to the priests of propaganda whose mission is to obfuscate and confuse. With luck, this approach could change the narrative being bandied about by certain political leaders who shall remain nameless.
“Democratizing access to information may provide a means of bypassing the climate trolls who insist global warming is a settled science being thwarted by an industry-orchestrated disinformation conspiracy. It could empower people to make up their own minds without being distracted by merchants of smear propagandists whose mission is to obfuscate and confuse the public with unsupportable innuendo about ‘industry-bought skeptic scientists.’ With luck, this approach could change the narrative being bandied about by certain far-left political leaders who shall remain nameless.”
Fixed your sentences there for ya. Acutely ironic that you wish for free access to data, when the effort to get raw data and correspondence regarding its adjustment process from your side is like pulling teeth. The one situation your side will never be able to bury was when Warwick Hughes was simply asking for such data, and Phil Jones responded with, “We have 25 or so years invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you, when your aim is to try and find something wrong with it?”
I’d say Phil Jones showed remarkable restraint in dealing with a troll.