So much for Global warming

[Christi]

It is snowing rather hard here in Texas. I haven't seen this much snow since I was a little kid. Another day of 3 kids driving me nuts. Looks like I am gonna be pulling out the benadryl j/k!!!

[Premium Parrots]

and the duct tape

[LaZeR]

Re: So much for Global warming

It is snowing rather hard here in Texas. I haven't seen this much snow since I was a little kid. Another day of 3 kids driving me nuts. Looks like I am gonna be pulling out the benadryl j/k!!!

Well we do normally get hit fairly heavy with snow up here in Western PA, however with that said, yes Al Gore is full of shit.

I can't even get in my friggin driveway, had to park on the road last night and shovel a build up 3' high (mainly from the snowplow - end of driveway ordeal)... took me an hour and after midnight. Had to leave my car in that little swath I cleared and walk to and from last night/this morning 100' through 12" of snow to my house. We've had about 25 inches of snow since the past weekend and another front is supposedly scheduled in for the start of next week. Already nearly broke my back this past Saturday shoveling 120' driveway by hand clearing roughly 16" of snow from that storm.

PS: Need some Xanax, Christy?

and the duct tape

I don't understand how shoving a gerbil up my ass is going to help me remove snow any faster? :?

[Veganpunk]

Global warming is just "warming" It's extreme temperatures, hot or cold.

Just sayin.

[Christi]

LOL yeah well I hear warming and think heat...this is not heat! I moved from IL to get away from this crap!

Yeah I need some xanax, lol. They are already driving me nuts to go out in the cold snow and play...all I need, sick kids.

[justintempler]

Global warming is just "warming" It's extreme temperatures, hot or cold.

Just sayin.

+1

It's called Global warming. Artic ice melting has a way of fraking with the jet stream which means we can still have big snow storms.

Christi, If it makes you feel any better I'll put in an order for twice as many hot record temperature days.

[Christi]

NO, don't do that! I can deal with cold just don't like driving in this crap. My girls don't ride the bus, too young, so I drive them. They are home today and it just irritates me that TX can't figure out how to clear the roads. Not to mention the fact that I live in BFE and the roads are always horrible.

[justintempler]

... it just irritates me that TX can't figure out how to clear the roads. Not to mention the fact that I live in BFE and the roads are always horrible.

You can't have small government and low taxes and expect them to be able to have a fleet of snow trucks and mountains of salt. You want to have your cake and eat it too. :wink:

[sagedil]

Global warming is just "warming" It's extreme temperatures, hot or cold.

Just sayin.

+1

It's called Global warming. Artic ice melting has a way of fraking with the jet stream which means we can still have big snow storms.

Christi, If it makes you feel any better I'll put in an order for twice as many hot record temperature days.

Sigh.

Anyone here read weatherunderground??? Do you know who Jeff Masters is???


Heavy snow events--a contradiction to global warming theory?


Global warming skeptics regularly have a field day whenever a record snow storm pounds the U.S., claiming that such events are inconsistent with a globe that is warming. If the globe is warming, there should, on average, be fewer days when it snows, and thus fewer snow storms. However, it is possible that if climate change is simultaneously causing an increase in ratio of snowstorms with very heavy snow to storms with ordinary amounts of snow, we could actually see an increase in very heavy snowstorms in some portions of the world. There is evidence that this is happening for winter storms in the Northeast U.S.--the mighty Nor'easters like the "Snowmageddon" storm of February 5-6 and "Snowpocalypse" of December 19, 2009. Let's take a look at the evidence. There are two requirements for a record snow storm:

1) A near-record amount of moisture in the air (or a very slow moving storm).
2) Temperatures cold enough for snow.

It's not hard at all to get temperatures cold enough for snow in a world experiencing global warming. According to the 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, the globe warmed 0.74°C (1.3°F) over the past 100 years. There will still be colder than average winters in a world that is experiencing warming, with plenty of opportunities for snow. The more difficult ingredient for producing a record snowstorm is the requirement of near-record levels of moisture. Global warming theory predicts that global precipitation will increase, and that heavy precipitation events--the ones most likely to cause flash flooding--will also increase. This occurs because as the climate warms, evaporation of moisture from the oceans increases, resulting in more water vapor in the air. According to the 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, water vapor in the global atmosphere has increased by about 5% over the 20th century, and 4% since 1970. This extra moisture in the air will tend to produce heavier snowstorms, assuming it is cold enough to snow. Groisman et al. (2004) found a 14% increase in heavy (top 5%) and 20% increase in very heavy (top 1%) precipitation events in the U.S. over the past 100 years, though mainly in spring and summer. However, the authors did find a significant increase in winter heavy precipitation events have occurred in the Northeast U.S. This was echoed by Changnon et al. (2006), who found, "The temporal distribution of snowstorms exhibited wide fluctuations during 1901-2000, with downward 100-yr trends in the lower Midwest, South, and West Coast. Upward trends occurred in the upper Midwest, East, and Northeast, and the national trend for 1901-2000 was upward, corresponding to trends in strong cyclonic activity."

The strongest cold-season storms are likely to become stronger and more frequent for the U.S.
The U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) began as a presidential initiative in 1989 and was mandated by Congress in the Global Change Research Act of 1990 (P.L. 101-606), which called for "a comprehensive and integrated United States research program which will assist the Nation and the world to understand, assess, predict, and respond to human-induced and natural processes of global change." This program has put out some excellent peer-reviewed science on climate change that, in my view, is as authoritative as the U.N.-sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports. In 2009, the USGCRP put out its excellent U.S. Climate Impacts Report, summarizing the observed and forecast impacts of climate change on the U.S. The report's main conclusion about cold season storms was " Cold-season storm tracks are shifting northward and the strongest storms are likely to become stronger and more frequent".

The report's more detailed analysis: "Large-scale storm systems are the dominant weather phenomenon during the cold season in the United States. Although the analysis of these storms is complicated by a relatively short length of most observational records and by the highly variable nature of strong storms, some clear patterns have emerged (Kunkel et al., 2008).

Storm tracks have shifted northward over the last 50 years as evidenced by a decrease in the frequency of storms in mid-latitude areas of the Northern Hemisphere, while high-latitude activity has increased. There is also evidence of an increase in the intensity of storms in both the mid- and high-latitude areas of the Northern Hemisphere, with greater confidence in the increases occurring in high latitudes (Kunkel et al., 2008). The northward shift is projected to continue, and strong cold season storms are likely to become stronger and more frequent, with greater wind speeds and more extreme wave heights". The study also noted that we should expect an increase in lake-effect snowstorms over the next few decades. Lake-effect snow is produced by the strong flow of cold air across large areas of relatively warmer ice-free water. The report says, "As the climate has warmed, ice coverage on the Great Lakes has fallen. The maximum seasonal coverage of Great Lakes ice decreased at a rate of 8.4 percent per decade from 1973 through 2008, amounting to a roughly 30 percent decrease in ice coverage. This has created conditions conducive to greater evaporation of moisture and thus heavier snowstorms. Among recent extreme lake-effect snow events was a February 2007 10-day storm total of over 10 feet of snow in western New York state. Climate models suggest that lake-effect snowfalls are likely to increase over the next few decades. In the longer term, lake-effect snows are likely to decrease as temperatures continue to rise, with the precipitation then falling as rain".

Commentary
Of course, both climate change contrarians and climate change scientists agree that no single weather event can be blamed on climate change. However, one can "load the dice" in favor of events that used to be rare--or unheard of--if the climate is changing to a new state. It is quite possible that the dice have been loaded in favor of more intense Nor'easters for the U.S. Mid-Atlantic and Northeast, thanks to the higher levels of moisture present in the air due to warmer global temperatures. It's worth mentioning that heavy snow storms should be getting increasingly rare for the extreme southern portion of the U.S. in coming decades. There's almost always high amounts of moisture available for a potential heavy snow in the South--just not enough cold air. With freezing temperatures expected to decrease and the jet stream and associated storm track expected to move northward, the extreme southern portion of the U.S. should see a reduction in both heavy and ordinary snow storms in the coming decades.

The CapitalClimate blog has a nice perspective on "Snowmageddon", and Joe Romm of climateprogress.org has some interesting things to say about snowstorms in a warming climate.

References
Changnon, S.A., D. Changnon, and T.R. Karl, 2006, , "Temporal and Spatial Characteristics of Snowstorms in the Contiguous United States", J. Appl. Meteor. Climatol., 45, 1141.1155.

Groisman, P.Y., R.W. Knight, T.R. Karl, D.R. Easterling, B. Sun, and J.H. Lawrimore, 2004, "Contemporary Changes of the Hydrological Cycle over the Contiguous United States: Trends Derived from In Situ Observations," J. Hydrometeor., 5, 64-85.

Kunkel, K.E., P.D. Bromirski, H.E. Brooks, T. Cavazos, A.V. Douglas, D.R. Easterling, K.A. Emanuel, P.Ya. Groisman, G.J. Holland, T.R. Knutson, J.P. Kossin, P.D. Komar, D.H. Levinson, and R.L. Smith, 2008: Observed changes in weather and climate extremes. In: Weather and Climate Extremes in a Changing Climate: Regions of Focus: North America, Hawaii, Caribbean, and U.S. Pacific Islands [Karl, T.R., G.A. Meehl, C.D. Miller, S.J. Hassol, A.M. Waple, and W.L. Murray (eds.)]. Synthesis and Assessment Product 3.3. U.S. Climate Change Science Program, Washington, DC, pp.
35-80.


http://www.wunderground.com/blog/Jef...?entrynum=1427

[Christi]

... it just irritates me that TX can't figure out how to clear the roads. Not to mention the fact that I live in BFE and the roads are always horrible.

You can't have small government and low taxes and expect them to be able to have a fleet of snow trucks and mountains of salt. You want to have your cake and eat it too. :wink:

I don't even want to address this.

[LaZeR]

Its real. Run for the hills....

/Thread

[RRK]

Anyone here read weatherunderground??? Do you know who Jeff Masters is???
[b]

Isn't that the group that declared war against the US government and blew a bunch of stuff up in the 70's?

[Christi]

Sage

That is interesting. I honestly wasn't very educated, and was really trying to be funny. Thank you for the info.

I don't like the snow for the reasons stated above. But since I am not leaving the house I won't complain about the weather, but the kids that are running around begging to play the Wii, go outside, make cookies..oh and the baby keeps streaking. Otherwise, I really don't mind. I could have made my dad use his vehicle with the 4 wheel drive on and take them, but I was just too dang lazy to get them ready for school, so really it is all my fault they are home driving me nuts. It is ok tho, in order for them to do anything they want they have to fold underwear and socks for me. Great way to get things done around her. Free slave labor!

[Premium Parrots]

Re: So much for Global warming

I don't understand how shoving a gerbil up my ass is going to help me remove snow any faster? :?

......... its no wonder you have girlfriend problems. :wink:

[LaZeR]

Re: So much for Global warming

I don't understand how shoving a gerbil up my ass is going to help me remove snow any faster? :?

......... its no wonder you have girlfriend problems. :wink:

INORITE?