Category: Climate Change

Here comes winter

~ susie ~ 5 Comments

I guess I should start stocking up if we’re going to have a bad winter:

Expect temperatures 6 degrees colder than last winter’s, and a six-fold increase — or more — in snowfall.


In short, if Accu-Weather’s winter outlook turns out to be right, the coming season will be whole lot more like a typical winter than in 2011-12.


In the forecast released this morning, an update and elaboration of an earlier outlook, the commercial weather service in State College, Pa., is calling for near-normal temperatures this winter, with above-normal snowfall.


In addition, Accu-Weather believes Philadelphia will have an above-average number of days — perhaps seven — with snowfall of an inch or more, said long-range forecaster Paul Pastelok. Last season, it had exactly one.


The revised snow-outlook map sees the above-average snow zone extending from Philadelphia on south and west.


To the north, long-range forecaster Paul Pastelok says snowfall might not be terribly generous along the New England coast because Atlantic Ocean sea-surface temperatures up that way are well above averages.

The future is on thin ice

~ odd man out ~ 2 Comments

The big story this week were those topless shots of Kate Middleton. Meanwhile, scientists studying the North Pole presented data indicating that the end of the world as we know it is imminent. Ho-hum:

Arctic sea ice has shrunk to its smallest surface area since record-keeping began, taking the world into “uncharted territory” as climate change intensifies, US scientists warned Wednesday.


Satellite images show the ice cap had melted to 1.32 million square miles (3.4 million square kilometers) as of September 16, the predicted lowest point for the year.


That’s the smallest Arctic ice cover since record-keeping began in 1979, the National Snow and Ice Data Center said.


“We are now in uncharted territory,” the center’s director, Mark Serreze, said, in a statement…


Scientists use Arctic sea ice extent as an indicator of what’s happening with the overall climate. Despite year-to-year fluctuations from natural weather variations, the ice cap has shown a clear trend towards shrinking over the last 30 years, the NSIDC center said…


“…Twenty years from now in August you might be able to take a ship right across the Arctic Ocean,” once blocked year-round by ice, said NSIDC scientist Julienne Stroeve.


Climate models predict “ice free conditions” before 2050, she added, but said the decline appears to be happening faster than predicted.


The NSIDC warned that increased heat and moisture from the melting Arctic ice cover could have global climate implications.


“This will gradually affect climate in the areas where we live,” he said. “We have a less polar pole — and so there will be more variations and extremes.”

Warming up for West Nile

~ odd man out ~ 1 Comment

From Scientific American:

According to the Centers for Disease Control, there have been over 1100 reported cases of West Nile virus disease in the US this year, including 42 deaths. If these numbers seem high, they are – in fact, it’s the highest number of reported cases since West Nile was first detected in the US in 1999, and West Nile season has just begun.

Though the CDC doesn’t have an official response to that question, the director of the CDC’s Vector-Borne Infectious Disease Division said that ‘unusually warm weather’ may be to blame. So far, 2012 is the hottest year on record in the United States according to the National Climatic Data Center, with record-breaking temperatures and drought a national norm…

Fuel efficiency

~ susie

Good:

The Obama administration will finalize strict new fuel-efficiency vehicle standards Tuesday, requiring the U.S. auto fleet to average 54.5 miles per gallon by 2025, according to individuals briefed on the matter.


The new rules, which expand on existing standards requiring American-made cars and light trucks to average 34.5 mpg by 2016, will significantly cut U.S. oil consumption and greenhouse gas emissions by the time they are fully implemented, the Environmental Protection Agency says. Unlike many energy policies enacted under President Obama, the vehicle standards are a relatively uncontroversial move embraced by industry and environmentalists alike.

U.S. court backs King Coal

~ odd man out

Yes, there are many troglodytes posing as federal judges. Greenland is melting along with much of the ice at the North Pole. Middle America is reeling from a drought that next year will push food prices sky-high. The air is filthy with carcinogens and other nasties. But don’t mess with our coal-fired economic “recovery,” you treacherous tree huggers:

A US appeals court overturned a key Obama administration rule to reduce harmful emissions from coal-fired power plants on Tuesday.

The Columbia district circuit appeals court said in a 2-1 decision that the Environmental Protection Agency had exceeded its mandate with the rule, which was to limit sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions from power plants in 28 mostly eastern states and Texas.

The court sent the cross-state air pollution rule for revision, telling the agency to administer its existing clean air interstate rule – the Bush-era regulation that it was updating – in the interim. The EPA said it was reviewing the ruling.

The decision was cheered by Republicans who have made the EPA and President Barack Obama’s environmental policies a major campaign issue ahead of November elections. The agency is risking a fragile economic recovery by saddling US industries with costly new rules, Republicans say…

Warming up

~ susie ~ 2 Comments

I don’t think anything I have much to add that wouldn’t be gilding this particular lily:

A reactor at the Millstone nuclear plant in Waterford, Conn., has shut down because of something that its 1960s designers never anticipated: the water in Long Island Sound was too warm to cool it.

Under the reactor’s safety rules, the cooling water can be no higher than 75 degrees. On Sunday afternoon, the water’s temperature soared to 76.7 degrees, prompting the operator, Dominion Power, to order the shutdown of the 880-megawatt reactor.

“Temperatures this summer are the warmest we’ve had since operations began here at Millstone,’’ said a spokesman for Dominion, Ken Holt. The plant’s first reactor, now retired, began operation in 1970.

The plant’s third reactor was still running on Monday, but engineers were watching temperature trends carefully out of concern that it, too, might have to shut down.

[…] The water from the sound is piped into the plant to absorb heat from pumps and other pieces of equipment. As the sound’s temperature inched upward this summer, Dominion Power received permission from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to measure it at three locations instead of one and to calculate the average in the hope that it would be lower. That did not help on Sunday.

And higher water temperatures could lie ahead. The sound’s temperature usually does not peak until late August.

Eventually, engineers could change the Millford reactor’s intake pipe so it draws water from further below the surface, where temperatures are lower, Mr. Holt said. They could also sharpen their pencils and try to determine whether the plant can operate safely with cooling water above 75 degrees, but neither is a short-term project.

Cloud cover and the mixing of some cooler rainfall might also bring down temperatures, Mr. Holt suggested.