Climate Cast: Why record cold Antarctic temp has no connection with climate change

MPR meteorologist Paul Huttner joins Kerri Miller Thursdays at 9:50 a.m. on The Daily Circuit for "Climate Cast" on MPR News Stations to talk about the latest research on our changing climate and the consequences that we're seeing here in Minnesota and worldwide.

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These days it seems like we are witnessing climate changes unfold right before our very eyes. It’s not our imagination.

The nature of our seasons is changing. Spring blooms come earlier. Summers are more humid with a documented increase in extreme localized flash flood events – and more frequent droughts.

Fall lingers longer. Lakes freeze up later. Winters are trending shorter and noticeably, measurably milder. Plants and animals struggle to adapt new climate zones. National treasures like Yellowstone and the Black Hills are facing extreme climate changes.

We're all living witnesses to these rapid climate changes in our lifetime. This is no longer your grandparents' Minnesota or planet Earth.

Climate Cast for Dec. 12, 2013.

It got headlines, but the revelation of the coldest temperature ever recorded on earth from the week's meeting of The American Geophysical Union has little to do with climate change. NASA's Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer sensor on board NASA's Aqua satellite recorded a temperature of -135.8 degrees in eastern Antarctica in 2010, and readings close to that again this past July 31.

The readings were satellite based, not from standard ground thermometers. Here's a nice summary from USA Today.

Based on remote satellite measurements, scientists recently recorded that temperature at a desolate ice plateau in East Antarctica. It was the lowest temperature ever recorded on Earth, though it may not get that recognition in the official record book.

A NASA satellite measured that temperature in August 2010; on July 31 of this year, another bone-chilling temperature of -135.3 degrees was recorded.

"I've never been in conditions that cold, and I hope I never am," said ice scientist Ted Scambos of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo. "I am told that every breath is painful, and you have to be extremely careful not to freeze part of your throat or lungs when inhaling."

The official record, as measured by a thermometer, remains -128.6 degrees, set in Vostok, Antarctica, on July 21, 1983. The World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the official keepers of world weather records, recognizes only readings measured by thermometers on location, not remotely by satellite.

"Vostok is still the world's coldest recorded location," said Randy Cerveny, an Arizona State University professor of geography and the "rapporteur for climate extremes" at the WMO, via e-mail. "They are using remote sensing, not standard weather stations, so we at the World Meteorological Organization will not recognize that."

Cerveny noted that there is no way to determine the elevation of the remote-sensed value. Official temperature measurements must be made of the air about 7 feet above the ground, to prevent the ground temperature from impacting the air temperature.

The record for cold has little to do with global warming, because it is one spot in one place, said Waleed Abdalati, an ice scientist at the University of Colorado and NASA's former chief scientist.

Both Abdalati, who wasn't part of the measurement team, and Scambos said this is probably an unusual random reading in a place that hasn't been measured much and could have been colder or hotter in the past.

"It does speak to the range of conditions on this Earth, some of which we haven't been able to observe," Abdalati said.

Extreme summer weather linked to 'vanishing northern hemisphere cryosphere'

Meanwhile, on the other end of the planet, disappearing ice and snow in the northern hemisphere is increasingly being linked to changes in jet stream patterns. Bigger loops and a slower jet streams can produce more extreme heat waves, and other weather extremes. Here's a clip from the story in the journal Nature Climate Change.

Extreme summer weather in northern mid-latitudes linked to a vanishing cryosphere

Qiuhong Tang, Xuejun Zhang  & Jennifer A. Francis

The past decade has seen an exceptional number of unprecedented summer extreme weather events in northern mid-latitudes, along with record declines in both summer Arctic sea ice and snow cover on high-latitude land.

The underlying mechanisms that link the shrinking cryosphere with summer extreme weather, however, remain unclear. Here, we combine satellite observations of early summer snow cover and summer sea-ice extent with atmospheric reanalysis data to demonstrate associations between summer weather patterns in mid-latitudes and losses of snow and sea ice.

Results suggest that the atmospheric circulation responds differently to changes in the ice and snow extents, with a stronger response to sea-ice loss, even though its reduction is half as large as that for the snow cover.

Atmospheric changes associated with the combined snow/ice reductions reveal widespread upper-level height increases, weaker upper-level zonal winds at high latitudes, a more amplified upper-level pattern, and a general northward shift in the jet stream. More frequent extreme summer heat events over mid-latitude continents are linked with reduced sea ice and snow through these circulation changes.

Weather Forecaster Improvement Act moves to full House

I've talked a lot about the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's satellite and numerical weather prediction (modeling) gap in the past few years. If we want to keep up with the Europeans and get longer lead times on Hurricanes like Sandy, we need to invest in modeling and upgraded computing   power.

A bill working it's way through Congress may address some critical needs. Here's more from Andrew Freedman at Climate Central.

A major weather bill that would elevate critical weather forecasting within the nation's oceans, climate, and weather agency got one step closer to reality on Thursday as the House Science Committee approved it.

The bill, known as the “Weather Forecasting Improvement Act,” now heads to the full House for consideration. If it passes, and there are no guarantees given the small window left in the legislative calendar, it would be the first broadly focused weather bill to be enacted by Congress since the mid-1990s.

The bill would establish a research program within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration(NOAA) to extend the lead time for tornado warnings beyond 1 hour, and contains provisions aimed at closing the performance gaps between the agency’s weather forecasting computer models and those of other nations.

The current lead time for tornadoes nationwide is about 14 minutes, and many meteorologists believe that technological advancements could allow that time to be significantly increased. However, some social science research has shown that with lead times of longer than about 30 minutes, people may not respond appropriately to the danger. Instead they may delay seeking protective cover.

Geoengineering weaker hurricanes?

For the record, I'm not a fan of geoengineering. At least not yet. How can we possibly tinker with the atmosphere when we have little idea of any unintended consequences? We have already changed the chemistry of the atmosphere, with significant effects.

That said, here's an interesting piece that caught my eye on the notion of massive offshore wind farms to dissipate hurricane energy before it reaches the coast. I respect the thought that went into this, but what could possibly go wrong with this idea?

SAN FRANCISCO — Giant offshore wind farms could do more than provide electricity for major cities. They could suck the life and the power out of hurricanes barreling toward those cities, too, according to Stanford University research presented Monday at the American Geophysical Union fall meeting.

Stanford civil and environmental engineering professor Mark Z. Jacobson and his research team found that if it was feasible to build tens of thousands of wind power turbines off the shores of some of America’s cities most vulnerable to extreme weather, those cities would see lower wind speeds and less severe storm surges from approaching hurricanes.

The researchers imagined what would have happened if a massive wall of tens of thousands of wind turbines had been built before hurricanes Katrina and Sandy and ran computer simulations of both storms with and without offshore turbines constructed in their paths.

They concluced that the wind turbines could have sapped Katrina of so much energy that wind speeds would have been reduced by up to 50 percent at landfall and the hurricane's storm surge could have been reduced by about 72 percent, Jacobson said. It also would have generated 0.45 terawatts of wind power.

Hurricane Katrina, which devastated New Orleans and the Louisiana Gulf Coast in 2005, was the costliest and and one of the deadliest hurricanes to ever hit the U.S.

Jacobson's Katrina simulations assumed arrays of 70,000 turbines  — 300 gigawatts of installed power  — had been built 100 kilometers offshore southeast of New Orleans and were designed to withstand winds of up to 50 meters per second, just above the strength of a Category 3 hurricane, or roughly 111 mph.