WEEKLY CLIMATE NEWS

DataStreme ECS WEEK 8: 22-26 October 2012

ITEMS OF INTEREST

Monitoring El Niño and La Niña -- Scientists have suggested that a marginal El Niño event should develop during the next several months that will serve to affect weather patterns across the United States during the upcoming winter months. For more details on how to monitor these phenomena, please read this week's Supplemental Information.. In Greater Depth.
Nation's new weather and climate prediction center opens -- Early last week, NOAA officials, together with federal and state legislators and other officials from Maryland, officially opened NOAA's new Center for Weather and Climate Prediction on University of Maryland grounds in College Park, MD. This facility will house more than 800 employees of NOAA's Center for Weather and Climate Prediction who provide the nation with a broad range of environmental services including monitoring and forecasting weather and ocean conditions. The NOAA scientists will also be collaborating with faculty and students from the University of Maryland and other academic institutions. [NOAA News]
New supercomputing center opens for environmental sciences -- Last week, the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) opened its NCAR-Wyoming Supercomputing Center in Cheyenne, WY that contains a 1.5-petaflop IBM supercomputer known as "Yellowstone," one of the world's most powerful supercomputers dedicated to the geosciences. Some of the first projects to be run on Yellowstone will involve research directed at meteorological, oceanographic and climatological issues. At least ten percent of the power provided to the computer facility will be wind energy obtained from the nearby Happy Jack Wind Farm. [NCAR/UCAR AtmosNews]
Assessing the possibility of a hurricane striking southern California -- In a recent interview, Bill Patzert, an oceanographer and climatologist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory JPL was asked about the prospects for future tropical cyclones, such as hurricanes and tropical storms, in Southern California. He discussed the reasons why southern California has had few tropical cyclones and also identified some of the historical tropical systems that have reached the region. [NASA Earth]

CURRENT CLIMATE STATUS

September drought report -- The National Climate Data Center has posted its September 2012 drought report online. Using the Palmer Drought Severity Index, approximately 37 percent of the coterminous United States experienced severe to extreme drought conditions at the end of September, while approximately one percent of the area had severely to extremely wet conditions.
Summer days with triple-digit temperatures -- The US Department of Agriculture recently produce a map showing the number of 100 degree or greater days that were observed across the country between 1 June and 15 September 2012. [National Weather Service Forecast Office, Milwaukee]
Review of September 2012 global temperatures -- Preliminary data analyzed by scientists at NOAA's National Climatic Data Center indicated that the global combined land and ocean average surface temperature for the September 2012 was 0.67 Fahrenheit degrees above the 20th century average (1901-2000) for the month. Therefore, last month's global combined temperature tied September 2005 for the highest September temperature since global temperature records began in 1880. When considered separately, the monthly temperatures of the land surface for this recently concluded month resulted in the third highest September land surface temperature on record, while September monthly average temperature over the global oceans tied September 1997 for the second highest September ocean temperature in 133 years.
Weak El Niño conditions may have contributed to the above average ocean temperatures. Furthermore, when considering the combined land-ocean global temperature for the year to date, the temperature was the eight highest nine-month global temperature since 1880. The weakening of the La Niña at the start of the year, followed by ENSO-neutral conditions (El Niño/Southern Oscillation) and then weak El Niño conditions contributed to above average temperatures, especially over the oceans, which had the tenth warmest nine-month start to a calendar year on record. [NOAA/NCDC State of the Climate] Another version of the global temperature anomaly map for September 2012 is available. NOAA Environmental Visualization Lab .

CURRENT CLIMATE MONITORING

An All-Hazards Monitor -- This Web portal provides the user information from NOAA on current environmental events that may pose as hazards such as tropical weather, fire weather, marine weather, severe weather, drought and floods. [ NOAAWatch]
Global and US Hazards/Climate Extremes -- A review and analysis of the global impacts of various weather-related events, including drought, floods and storms during the current month. [ NCDC]

CLIMATE AND THE BIOSPHERE

Forest watersheds affected by ozone -- Scientists at with the US Forest Service and the US Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory have found that increased levels of near surface ozone may amplify the impacts of higher temperatures and reduced streamflow from forest watersheds across the Southeastern United States. This reduction in the streamflow could reduce the available water supplies needed to support forest ecosystems in the region. [Forest Service Southern Research Station]
A hands-off policy for downed trees may be best forest management decision -- Researchers at Harvard University report that the best management decision in terms of the health of forests, native plants and wildlife following intense wind and ice storms may be to do nothing. The researchers conclusions are based on a 20-year study at the Harvard Forest Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) site in Massachusetts. [National Science Foundation News]

CLIMATE FORECASTS

Official winter weather outlook released -- Late last week, forecasters at NOAA's Climate Prediction Center released their Winter Outlook for the upcoming meteorological winter (the three months of December 2012 through February 2013) across the nation. With current El Niño conditions being generally weak, they do not have as much confidence in their winter outlook as in the last several years. However, the forecasters foresee a better than equal chance for above average winter temperatures across the western half of the 48 coterminous United States, with the greatest degree of certainty for warm conditions centered on the Great Basin. On the other hand, they felt that the southern Florida would have a greater than even chance of experiencing below average temperatures. Since no clear cut signal appeared that would provide for a conclusive temperature outlook across the rest of the country, the forecasters felt that the most of the eastern half of the nation, as well as along the Pacific Coast would have equal chances of either below or above average temperatures.
The forecasters also call for better than even chances that the Pacific Northwest and the Upper Midwest (the upper Mississippi Valley and western Great Lakes) could experience below average winter precipitation, while sections of the Southeast, primarily across the Florida Panhandle and adjacent sections of Alabama and Georgia, would experience wet conditions. Elsewhere, near equal chances that above or below average precipitation could occur this winter. [NOAA News] Conventional seasonal outlook maps are also available.
[NOAA Climate Prediction Center] A summary 3-month outlook text discussion for non-technical users is available, along with a glossary of terms.
National seasonal drought outlook issued -- The forecasters with NOAA's Climate Prediction Center also issued their US Seasonal Drought Outlook that would run from late October 2012 through January 2013, covering the second half of meteorological autumn and most of meteorological winter. These forecasters foresee that the current drought conditions should persist across many areas of the nation west of the Mississippi River, including a few areas around the Great Lakes. Drought conditions were expected to expand into the interior Northwest and the northern Rockies. However, some improvement in the current drought conditions was expected across California and a few areas of the southern Plains and the lower and mid-Mississippi Valleys. Scattered areas across the Southeast could also experience some improvement in the drought conditions [NOAA Climate Prediction Center] Note: a Seasonal Drought Outlook Discussion is included describing the forecasters' confidence for their outlook.

CLIMATE AND SOCIETY

Website for human dimensions of climate change -- An interagency effort within the US federal government that included NOAA, the Bureau of Land Management and the US Forest Service, has resulted in a website called HD.gov (for HumanDimensions.gov) that provides users, such as natural resource managers, with information on the human dimensions on a variety of topics of interest such as climate change. [HD.gov]
Earthweek -- Diary of the Planet [earthweek.com] Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Concept of the Week: Seawater Salinity and Carbon Dioxide

The contemporary concern regarding global climate change has caused scientists to study the various factors that govern the ocean's ability to absorb atmospheric carbon dioxide. Concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, are on the rise primarily because of increased burning of fossil fuels. Higher levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide may be contributing to increased global temperatures, a condition often identified as global warming. The ocean's role in regulating the concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide depends on the temperature, salinity, and biological components of surface waters.

Studies show that the ocean's ability to absorb carbon dioxide is primarily temperature dependent. As noted in Chapter 8 of your textbook, gases are more soluble in cold seawater than warm seawater. Hence, changes in sea surface temperature affect the ability of the ocean to absorb carbon dioxide. We also found in Chapter 1, photosynthetic organisms assimilate carbon dioxide and release oxygen. Through cellular respiration, all organisms release carbon dioxide. Therefore, biological activity affects the ocean's ability to absorption of atmospheric carbon dioxide.

What about the effects of changes in salinity on the ocean's uptake of atmospheric carbon dioxide? Research from the Pacific Ocean near Hawaii provides some insight on this question. For nearly 20 years, scientists have been collecting physical, chemical and biological data through a large column of ocean water at Station ALOHA, a sampling site about 100 km (62 mi) north of Oahu that appears representative of oceanic conditions in the central North Pacific. In 2003, David M. Karl, a biogeochemist at the University of Hawaii in Honolulu, reported a decline in the rate at which surface ocean waters were absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. In 2001, the rate of carbon dioxide uptake was only about 15% of the rate in 1989. Why the change in carbon dioxide uptake? In this region of the Pacific north of Hawaii, sea surface temperatures showed no significant change during the period of observation but precipitation decreased and evaporation increased. Less precipitation associated with drought coupled with higher rates of evaporation caused the surface water salinity at ALOHA to increase by about 1%. Increasing salinity inhibits water's ability to absorb gases including carbon dioxide. Karl and his colleagues attribute 40% of the decline in the ocean's carbon dioxide uptake to the saltier waters. The balance of the decline may be due to changes in biological productivity or ocean mixing.

Projected changes in global climate indicate significant changes in precipitation around the globe including reduced precipitation over various large areas of the oceans, resulting in potential "drought" conditions. Since changes in oceanic salinity result from changes in precipitation, the contribution that salinity plays on future assimilation of atmospheric carbon dioxide by the ocean also becomes an important consideration.

Concept of the Week: Questions

Place your responses on the Chapter Progress Response Form provided in the Study Guide.

With rising sea surface temperatures, the rate of evaporation of seawater [(increases), (decreases)].
With increasing salinity and constant temperature, the amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide that is taken up by ocean water [(increases), (decreases)].

Historical Events:

22 October 1987...Yakutat, AK surpassed their previous all-time yearly precipitation total of 190 inches. Monthly records were set in June with 17 inches, in September with 70 inches, and in October with more than 40 inches. (Sandra and TI Richard Sanders - 1987)
24 October 1951...Sacramento, CA reported a barometric pressure of 29.42 inches, to establish a record low for October. (The Weather Channel)
25 October 1977...Dutch Harbor in Alaska reported a barometric pressure reading of 27.31 inches (925 millibars) to establish an all-time record for the state. (The Weather Channel)
26 October 1859...New York City had their earliest substantial snow of record as four inches blanketed the city. (David Ludlum)
26 October 1919...The temperature at Bismarck, ND plunged to ten degrees below zero, the earliest subzero reading of record for the city, and a record for the month of October. (The Weather Channel)
26 October 1926...Barrow, AK received a record fifteen inches of snow, and also established a 24-hour precipitation record of 1.00 inch, which lasted until the 21st of July in 1987. (The Weather Channel)
26 October 1993...The temperature at Eureka, CA soared to 87 degrees to set an all-time high temperature record for the city. (Intellicast)
27 October 1929...A snowstorm dumped 27 inches upon Ishpeming, MI in 24 hours to establish a state record. (David Ludlum)
28 October 1936...The temperature at Layton, NJ dipped to 9 degrees above zero to establish a state record for the month of October. (The Weather Channel)
28 October 1991...Yakima, WA recorded 2.4 inches of snow, equaling the record for October. (Intellicast)

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