Climatic lurch anybody?

[Stratos Ferric]

Apologies if this is but a slight variant on the "beginning of the end" thread - though that one is focussed on winter specifically.

The two threads are not unrelated. Tonight's plot shows the lowest annual temperature recorded in any five year period. Before AFF and co start complaining that this is a short period - I agree, it is, but equally using a thirty year baseline when assessing a series that is not flatlining, or deviatig within bounds, becomes less useful. The whole purpose of using a short series is exactly to illustrate how dramatic the current change in our climate seems. It might be a blip - five years is a short period - but it really should make us look hard at next year, and the year after. If we don't get a downward correction then my hypothesis will be that we really have lurched into a different climatic regime to that we have been used to.

As the plot shows, in the last ten years the baseline (for a cold year) has moved up about 1C: that from what was, historically, already a high starting point.

It's a crude extrapolation, but if you want to know how "bad" a winter we might now reasonably expect on this basis - see 2005/6.

[drgl]

05/06 may have been bad for some-here we had some decent ice days and plenty of snow in the later part of winter(not to mention notable snow fall in November).

I'm not disputing what you say however-this year will break a lot of records. I guess if we are in a climate shift(and lets face it-you would have to be nuts to deny things haven't changed since the late 70's) who knows if we will then see a dramatic shift back the other way? Fact is no body knows and in all honesty i think anything we do now will have very little impact on where this is going. Imagine if we were around with technolgy etc as it is now but just prior to when one of the last ice ages started, what would all the scientists be telling us to do? Pump as much Co2 out as possible to try and stop the on slaught of the ice?? Makes you think..........

Edited December 14, 2006 by drgl

[AtlanticFlamethrower]

I'll tell you what a lurch is - check out 1736/1745, 1881/1880. In contrast the warming has gone in steps. The recent warming is characterised by not having any cold plunges in between. So it's been up and up.

[The Enforcer]

05/06 may have been bad for some-here we had some decent ice days and plenty of snow in the later part of winter(not to mention notable snow fall in November).

And no doubt copious amounts of sleet. IF what SF hypothesises is true, then as that bad winter delivered nothing here, it really is the end for lying snow in these parts in my lifetime.

Edited December 14, 2006 by The Enforcer

[Upgrade]

And no doubt copious amounts of sleet. IF what SF hypothesises is true, then as that bad winter delivered nothing here, it really is the end for lying snow in these parts in my lifetime.

People say last winter was "bad" but it wasnn't - it was cool(ish) and dry / cloudy and calm, with a fair smattering of frosty days and nights.

We didn't have any lying snow at all last winter in London, and in the 10 years i have been here that's the first time its happened. we had a few minutes of flakey rubbish on ONE day that didn't really settle.

In the last 10 years we've had an average of 2 mornings a year of "lying" snow and this has never been more than a puny 3 or 4cm deep.

Over 50% of these falls give a temporary cover only lasting a few hours.

Maybe once during a heavy afternoon snowshower about 4 years ago, amounts stacked up to an enormous 5 cm ( people panicing and the standard saying freak blizzards sweep capital) but it was gone in the morning as it melted overnight.

This is the unexciting reality of snowfalls in most of lowland Britain which people should bear in mind when looking for snow in the charts, otherwise disapointment usually follows. It just aint that common anymore.

[The Enforcer]

Compared with what I've been seeing, or rather not seeing, over the last ten winters that's comparatively a lot. The concept of snowless winters is certainly nothing new to me, SF's stats merely back up what I've been experiencing on the ground.

[Upgrade]

Compared with what I've been seeing, or rather not seeing, over the last ten winters that's comparatively a lot. The concept of snowless winters is certainly nothing new to me, SF's stats merely back up what I've been experiencing on the ground.

really? i thought we came off worse than anyone here in London. why is it so snowless in Abingdon i wonder.

[MisfitDog3]

Surrey/Hants border is also astoundingly snow free. We don't really get affected by showers that plague the eastern coasts during easterly cold incursions, any northerlies are very tempered by the way they reach us and most of the moisture has been removed. The main hope we have is for an hour or so of snow on an encroaching front moving over cold air before it reverts back to rain or a Channel Low and the positioning is so sensitive on those you can wait forever.

East Surrey gets quite a lot of snow but over here in the West....nothing!

[The Enforcer]

really? i thought we came off worse than anyone here in London. why is it so snowless in Abingdon i wonder.

1. The latitude/longitude is crap - it's too far south for northerlies and too far west for easterlies, like West Surrey, but also too north for Channel Lows. It's too central.

2. The altitute is crap - 65m ASL at best (although there are hills within 3 miles that are around 150m ASL - still little snow here though).

In summary, it's crap. But in spite of being crap it still used to snow in copious amounts on average every other winter. Now look again at SF's chart and do the math.

Edited December 14, 2006 by The Enforcer

[acbrixton]

Surrey/Hants border is also astoundingly snow free. We don't really get affected by showers that plague the eastern coasts during easterly cold incursions, any northerlies are very tempered by the way they reach us and most of the moisture has been removed. The main hope we have is for an hour or so of snow on an encroaching front moving over cold air before it reverts back to rain or a Channel Low and the positioning is so sensitive on those you can wait forever.

East Surrey gets quite a lot of snow but over here in the West....nothing!

Yes MFD you are quite right: I lived in Weybridge. Lightwater,k Brrokwood and Byfleet from 1970 to 1988 (my mother is still in Byfleet) and it was quite noticeable that even in notably snowy spells we had relatively small amounts of snow at low levels: in 78/79 we never had more than 4" and I believe that that was the maximum until Feb 91. Since then we have had no more than 1" (even in the mid 1980s when as you say East Surrey recorded some quite heavy falls).

Regards

ACB

[Thundery wintry showers]

I would have expected London to be one of the most snowless places in lowland Britain- certainly it was more snowless than Abingdon over the period 1961-90, with an average of 5 days per year with lying snow, compared with about 7 in Abingdon. In recent years, though, London has picked up a few snow events from marginal setups with winds from the ENE, with 8 January 2003 sticking out but the easterly of late February 2005 also produced (I think) 16 consecutive days of snow falling.

In general London is relatively favoured when winds are from the ENE, but not if they're from any other direction.

As for Abingdon, I'm not sure when there will next be a significant snow event there.

[The Enforcer]

As for Abingdon, I'm not sure when there will next be a significant snow event there.

Neither am I - hence the need to snowchase - now no snow anywhere.

Stats from the metoffice?

[Paul]

To be honest, I think anyone sitting on their pc's now still denying some distinct warming is taking place perhaps needs to take a trip to a realism class. For whatever reason it is occuring (I'm not getting into that now), there can be no doubt that the phase we're in, is increasingly mild, increasingly snowless and increasingly concerning at its rate of change.

Can there still be cold spells/snaps? Yes, no doubt. Are these becoming far less frequent and far less potent? Yes, with even less doubt. Every season almost without fail is becoming warmer, 5 years is a very short time to read anything into, but unless things show a sign of reversing or at least slowing, then the change we witness is only going to become more dramatic imo.

[Calrissian]

I don't think 'realism class' is possible for the masses unless it directly affects them. Unless they are physically - or significantly financially affected, climate change does not exist.

Of course, by the time that happens, it'll be too late. London may end up permanently under water, and large chunks of the worlds food producing areas will become worthless.

---

Most people are ignorant. Accept that basic fact, and then assume you'd best find someplace more rural in the next decade or two for your own well being.

Calrissian: spacewalking on ISS

[Nath]

I don't think 'realism class' is possible for the masses unless it directly affects them. Unless they are physically - or significantly financially affected, climate change does not exist.

Of course, by the time that happens, it'll be too late. London may end up permanently under water, and large chunks of the worlds food producing areas will become worthless.

---

Most people are ignorant. Accept that basic fact, and then assume you'd best find someplace more rural in the next decade or two for your own well being.

Calrissian: spacewalking on ISS

Couldnt agree more Calissian. I give it 10-20 years max before a major decrease in human population due to starvation.

[Stratos Ferric]

Couldnt agree more Calissian. I give it 10-20 years max before a major decrease in human population due to starvation.

In some places it's been going on for a long while; oddly enough though, whilst the BBC have correspondents in Baghdad, Islamabaad, Bombay, New York, Cairo, Delhi and the UN...they don't have one in East Africa.

I have a hunch that whilst things will get harder for the world (they would anyway, simply by virtue of increasing population - the planet, after all, is finite), at least SOME corrective action would be taken before things got too desperate, but maybe that's just wishful thinking.

[Upgrade]

I would have expected London to be one of the most snowless places in lowland Britain- certainly it was more snowless than Abingdon over the period 1961-90, with an average of 5 days per year with lying snow, compared with about 7 in Abingdon. In recent years, though, London has picked up a few snow events from marginal setups with winds from the ENE, with 8 January 2003 sticking out but the easterly of late February 2005 also produced (I think) 16 consecutive days of snow falling.

In general London is relatively favoured when winds are from the ENE, but not if they're from any other direction.

As for Abingdon, I'm not sure when there will next be a significant snow event there.

Its true that London did have that "16 days of snowfall" in 2005. But none of it ever stuck. I think this was possibly the most frustrating snowfall of all time. It was close.....but no cigar - it may as well have rained .

In some places it's been going on for a long while; oddly enough though, whilst the BBC have correspondents in Baghdad, Islamabaad, Bombay, New York, Cairo, Delhi and the UN...they don't have one in East Africa.

I have a hunch that whilst things will get harder for the world (they would anyway, simply by virtue of increasing population - the planet, after all, is finite), at least SOME corrective action would be taken before things got too desperate, but maybe that's just wishful thinking.

many years ago, i heard a conspiracy theory that Prince Philip and the World Wildlife Fund (!) were planning to "manage down" the human population by 80%. They clearly haven't been particuarly effective so far whatever it is they were going to do!

[snowray]

In some places it's been going on for a long while; oddly enough though, whilst the BBC have correspondents in Baghdad, Islamabaad, Bombay, New York, Cairo, Delhi and the UN...they don't have one in East Africa.

I have a hunch that whilst things will get harder for the world (they would anyway, simply by virtue of increasing population - the planet, after all, is finite), at least SOME corrective action would be taken before things got too desperate, but maybe that's just wishful thinking.

Well more devastating fllods ravaging the horn of Africa I see, Kenya/Somalia etc.. And yet they still have a shortage of drinking water, the poor wretches over there having to buy clean water..It will be back to drought soon no doubt!

[BrickFielder]

Abrupt changes have occurred in weather. Most noticeable was the regime change in the Pacific around 1976 to 1977. Before which we had equal numbers of El Nino and La Nina episodes and since mainly El Nino. The 1970s North Pacific climate regime shift is marked by a notable transition from the persistent warming (cooling) condition over the central (eastern) North Pacific since the late 1960s toward the opposite condition around mid-1970s orchestrating with a deepening of the Aleutian Low and strengthening of the midlatitude westerlies (Mantua et al.1997; Zhang et al. 1997).

This abrupt change shows up in changes to ENSO, the PDO index and AO index. More specifically the AO index has become more positive since 1976 with the result that the UK is now warmer and conversely much of Alaska has been cooling since 1976.

This change is the most notable one but there have been others although the statistical evidence is less compelling. 1989 and 1998 seem to also have seen slight regime shifts and maybe the fact that there were El Ninos in 1976-1977 1997-1998 is significant.

Similarly the NAO index shows tendencies to shift rather abruptly although not necessarily at the same point as Pacific regime shifts. Current thinking is that the regime shifts in both the Atlantic and Pacific basins are attributed to the delayed adjustment of the subtropical ocean circulation to the persistent wind stress anomalies prior to the climate regime shift. In other words long periods of anomalous high or low pressure in the northern subtropical basins of the Atlantic and Pacific can set off regime changes (lurches). Which is a bit worrying because we have had a long period of low pressure around Iceland this autumn.

This does not mean that all of the warming in the UK is attributable to this or that global warming is not taking place. Changes in our weather can have complex and multiple origins and these regime changes may well be linked to global warming through increased anomalous conditions in the northern oceans.

[bennytes]

HOW do you explain why Greenland was populated, and sustaining a healthy population centuries ago? WHAT caused THAT particular bout of global warming? That question NEEDS to be answered!

There are governments WORLDWIDE now, waiting to pounce on their populations with ''carbon taxes'', ''green taxes'' etc etc, and all threads like this are doing is PROVIDING them with the ammunition to go ahead with them! ''Look, they're even saying it's their fault!''

DON'T do their work for them! Let THEM come up with the incontrivertable evidence that humans use of fossil fuels IS to blame, then THEY, and they alone bear the responsibility for any consequences! NOT US, the poor bloody workers! We are held hostage by fossil fuels because we HAVE to use them to merely survive and stay warm in the winter! There are a very few people on this planet who are MEGA wealthy from the use of fossil fuels, maybe we should strip them of that wealth to pay for new technologies and damage mitigation that we are going to need in the future! If it IS found that fossil fuels are to blame, then it's a no-brainer! We HAVE to strip these people of their wealth!

Though be SCEPTICAL until convinced otherwise! DON'T DO THEIR WORK FOR THEM!

[osmposm]

HOW do you explain why Greenland was populated, and sustaining a healthy population centuries ago?

Bennytes. I think you should do a little bit of research on just how healthy - and sustained - the population of Greenland was during the Mediaeval "Warm" Period.

There are a very few people on this planet who are MEGA wealthy from the use of fossil fuels, maybe we should strip them of that wealth to pay for new technologies and damage mitigation that we are going to need in the future! If it IS found that fossil fuels are to blame, then it's a no-brainer! We HAVE to strip these people of their wealth!

As for removing guilty rich people's wealth in order to provide bottomless pots of money to help everyone....well, it's a delight to find an unreformed Marxist alive and well in the UK. Alas, the maths doesn't work: you get a once off distribution of nothing like the size you imagine - and certainly nothing like enough to solve this problem - and then it's gone. In subsequent years you're back where you started; and, of course, you've lost the energetic entrepeneurs who, on the whole, work hard and imaginatively to increase the size of the overall pot, even when their motivation is entirely selfish. It used to be called "killing the goose that lays the golden egg". Oh, and I think they tried it for a while in Russia and China and a few other places.....didn't work out too well.

Edited December 15, 2006 by osmposm

[Upgrade]

HOW do you explain why Greenland was populated, and sustaining a healthy population centuries ago? WHAT caused THAT particular bout of global warming? That question NEEDS to be answered!

Greenland still is populated.

it never had huge cities or supported a larger population than now. It's steadily increased over the centuries and is about 56, 000 now.

[acbrixton]

There are governments WORLDWIDE now, waiting to pounce on their populations with ''carbon taxes'', ''green taxes'' etc etc, and all threads like this are doing is PROVIDING them with the ammunition to go ahead with them! ''Look, they're even saying it's their fault!''

DON'T do their work for them! Let THEM come up with the incontrivertable evidence that humans use of fossil fuels IS to blame, then THEY, and they alone bear the responsibility for any consequences! NOT US, the poor bloody workers! We are held hostage by fossil fuels because we HAVE to use them to merely survive and stay warm in the winter!

In addition to the errors identified by Osmposm there is a further error (if I have understood your post correctly): in a democracy governments govern on behalf of the electorate; if the electorate disagrees with policy it has the right and ability to vote for an alternative. It thus makes little sense to blame governments for policy errors where the electorate has failed to vote them out at the next election.

Even if it did make sense to blame a government as opposed to those who elected it it would make no sense to hold "them" liable. How do you suppose members of a government could make financial reparation for such errors? Governments, as Mrs Thatcher never tired of saying, do not have money or resouces of their own: thry raise money either from taxation or by borrowing (future taxpayers repay the loans).

Regards

ACB

[Stratos Ferric]

...

DON'T do their work for them! Let THEM come up with the incontrivertable evidence that humans use of fossil fuels IS to blame, then THEY, and they alone bear the responsibility for any consequences! NOT US, the poor bloody workers! We are held hostage by fossil fuels because we HAVE to use them to merely survive and stay warm in the winter! There are a very few people on this planet who are MEGA wealthy from the use of fossil fuels, maybe we should strip them of that wealth to pay for new technologies and damage mitigation that we are going to need in the future! If it IS found that fossil fuels are to blame, then it's a no-brainer! We HAVE to strip these people of their wealth!

Though be SCEPTICAL until convinced otherwise! DON'T DO THEIR WORK FOR THEM! :lol:

It all rather makes you wonder how ever mankind flourished prior to the mid C18th doesn't it. I guess they used to wear an extra jumper or light a bigger fire?

The energy we all use to keep warm is a small sliver in the pie chart of consumption. Your share of every flight you make abroad uses more energy than you consume in a year keeping your house warmer than it needs to be. We none of us really need cars.

We consume because we can, not because we need to; if we spoil the earth we are all to blame, just like if I get fat I'm the one to blame, or if I crash my car whilst using the mobile phone it's my fault - not the car manufacturer or the mobile phone manufacturer.

Had to laugh at Osmposm's comment about unrefined marxist: line of the week for me.

[coldfingers]

It all rather makes you wonder how ever mankind flourished prior to the mid C18th doesn't it. I guess they used to wear an extra jumper or light a bigger fire?

They survived by burning loads of logs, contributing to deforesting the countryside and poluting the air. However their impact was very small because the population was very small.

Today I really can't see why the government couldn't issue legislation that evey new house built should have solar panels built into it, thereby reducing the cost of fitting later. A small help perhaps but at the moment the gov stand to gain a tremendous amount by VAT on fuel, be it gas, electricity, oil or petrol. can't really see them wanting to lose that.