"Thousand -Year Summer Storms" - Expect More And More

The headline on p. 6 in the latest TIME blared:  "A Thousand Year Storm Hits Louisiana" , which seems barely weeks after we read of another such event bashing Maryland, and earlier West Virginia. Are these just "coincidental" meteorological events or might they be somehow tied to the advent of even more ferocious climate change, global warming.

In the case of all the previous events and especially in LA, we are informed "the air had been full of moisture - meteorologists call it 'precipitable water'- so all it took was a modest front to make the skies burst.'

The piece then went on to point out "Epic floods have hit the South with alarming frequency in recent months."

Indeed, and make no mistake at root global warming IS the culprit.

We now know from research published by Dim Coumou and colleagues at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research that rapid Arctic warming has bolstered summer heat waves. These heat waves have engendered warmer, moister atmosphere of the type most likely to trigger massive floods, including the so-called "thousand year events".

At the same time Coumou et al have found a decrease in continent cooling storms as a result of a weakened jet stream, owing to an Arctic warming twice as fast as lower latitudes in the Northern hemisphere. This rapid Arctic warming has in effect reduced the temperature differential that drives the polar winds- thereby weakening the jet stream.

Previous studies that investigated the impact of the dwindling jet stream on lower latitude only focused on fall and winter effects. During these intervals the Arctic Ocean warms the overlying air, obscuring the jet stream effects to Coumou et al instead. Focused on summers using meteorological data from 1979-2013.

The work, published in Science (3/12/15)  showed that the summer jet stream slowed by 5 percent during that interval. That slowing in turn caused a 10 percent decrease in the energy available to power cooler summer storms.

The result? Without the relief afforded by the cooler summer storms, the N. Hemisphere faces longer and longer bouts of intense summer heat. This in turn will make the atmosphere more "precipitable" opt laden with water, which upon being triggered will lead to more "thousand year flood events" such as we have seen.

The takeaway is that rapid climate change is already ravaging large swaths of the country, as well as the planet. It is not some distant future as the climate deniers make out, but upon us right now.  If the deniers - mainly driven by capitalist Neoliberal economics - have their way, nothing will be done. They talk about raising misplaced alarm, but what else to call  an event that (according to TIME)  "has left more than 30,000 people evacuated from their homes" with "30 of Louisiana's 64 parishes declared disaster areas."

If the climate change deniers don't recognize such events as alarming and worthy  of  action, then one can only conclude they are either blind, brainwashed by the fossil fuelers or simply don't care what happens to their fellow humans. Particularly those that are in harm's way because of the adversely changing conditions.

Or, maybe the deniers are fortunate to live in such rarefied digs or gated communities they  feel they'll be spared whatever happens to the rest of us who aren't so lucky. Hence, they can afford to put  capital markets and economics above all other priorities.

A serious error, if ever there was one.

Warmest Xmas Ever In East: But Don't Celebrate!

Well, would you celebrate the birth of a three-headed infant? I don't think so! You'd understand instinctively it's unnatural. Humans do not have 3-headed babies, it's a simple statement of fact. Hence, something serious must be wrong with this picture. In like manner, people shouldn't be celebrating a 66F Christmas Day in New York, or a 70 F Christmas Eve. Because in meteorological terms such temperatures in December for eastern cities are just as unnatural as 3-headed babies. But to hear and see some people, it's a "gift".

Really?

In fact would you regard it as a gift when the next El Nino erupts and you have temperatures of 90- 95 F on Christmas Day? Don't believe it can happen? Think again! Also, that such high temperature conditions will one day become permanent through the entire year - not just the odd time or during a heat wave or a few summer months.

Many people - such as the guy on an NBC segment two days ago who exclaimed "This is nuts!" - want to believe this is just an aberration, an unusually warm but annoying few days in one warmish December. But I have news for them: it's just the beginning of ever escalating temperature aberrations including intense heat waves which will also see "cool" temperatures at night barely different from daytime highs. Get braced for an accelerated period of global warming! Welcome to the pre-runaway greenhouse effect phase!

Oh, for sure, the meteorologists  (like NBC's Al Roker, a global warming skeptic) will point to large high pressure domes over the nation's midsection or 'deformed' jet streams and expatiate on  how long they may last. The impression given here is of a transitory meteorological phenomenon which has little or no connection to climate science. So we just need to expect in coming years that the jet stream will float high over Canada making conditions unbearably hot by keeping the jet stream away and hot air flooding in from the south.

But these guys never touch on the whys and wherefores! Well, Geophysicist and climate scientist S. George Philander did more than 17 years ago in a small but hot-button piece in Eos: Transactions of the American Geophysical Union (March 31, 1998):‘Who is El Nino?’

Philander argued that El Nino and its sister cyclic counterpart 'La Nina' are not merely the yin and yangs of a meteorological cycle (La Nina from current forecasts is due to ramp up the end of next year) but actually offshoots of climate change in terms of their expected future behavior. Thus, as more CO2 is pumped into the atmosphere (as indicated by the Keeling curve - which shows CO2 injection has exceeded the absorption capacity of the oceans), El Nino will ramp up leading to blistering hot and dry conditions, even as La Nina continues her antics bringing cooler spells and precip. However, unmentioned is the game changer of altered albedo.

For reference, the heating effects are largely tied to increases in ocean temperatures for El Nino. For the past several months these temperatures have reached 3.6F higher than normal. In its early stages EL Nino had already spun off environmental havoc including "red tides" - from a certain species of algae, as well as rendering a species of crab inedible that usually thrives in the sea waters off southern California. This effect has been combined with unusual jet stream flows this December to effectively turn the nation schizoid - with we in the West having the usual normal cold temperature (it is 18F now as I write this) while those in the eastern U.S. bask in unusually warm temperatures with amped up warm, moist air entering from the Gulf.

To grasp this, try to think of what happens when you open the door of your fridge and allow it to defrost. Over a rather brief time interval all your ice melts (de-frosting) and the fridge (if left open)  will reach thermal equilibrium with the room temperature. At this point no ice remains at all, and meanwhile your electric bill will soar. In a similar way, the Arctic is defrosting (and to a lesser extent the Antarctic) and this is encapsulated in the lower diagram.

The defrosting of the Arctic arises from the melting of its polar ice and sea ice, as well as large glaciers and that includes much of the land mass of Greenland. The situation worsens as temperatures (from higher CO2 levels) lead to earlier and earlier melting, analogous to leaving the fridge door open longer and longer. Surface temperatures last summer ranged up to 3 Celsius higher than average and generated a much earlier melting.

When snow melts, grains tend to cluster in a process called 'constructive metamorphism. This reduces the albedo or reflectivity of the surface - leading to increased absorption of solar radiation. Meanwhile, bare ice is much less reflective than snow, absorbing even more solar radiation and further speeding any melting. (In the diagram, the red arrows indicate incoming radiation and the blue arrows indicate radiation reflected back into space. Percentages give the amounts of reflected incoming solar radiation).

All this - combined with an intense El Nino - paved the way for the abnormal temperatures we're seeing now in the eastern U.S.  The other aspect to bear in mind, as Philander noted, is that the El Ninos in the future -fed by global warming - will steadily increase in intensity. The EL Nino -La Nnia oscillation itself will keep going until the first 'year of no seasons' predicted by David Suzuki as long ago as 1991.  He estimated in his book, 'It's A Matter of Survival' (1991), that the first year of no season would occur in 2040. But given the pace of warming has ramped up to the point a 2C target threshold is now mostly regarded as a pipedream (given no serious carbon emissions cuts) we will likely see that first year of no seasons as early as 2030.

As a recent TIME report noted (Dec. 28, p. 18):

"A 3.5 C temperature rise would occur even if all (200) nations meet initial pledges to reduce carbon emissions.  This would still submerge coastal cities and drive over half of species to extinction."

It would also make life so horrific for humans, they will wish for extinction. Think of 6-8 month heat waves lasting even through supposed 'cold' months and temperatures hitting 95F- 100 F regularly - even in December. Think of it happening not just in the U.S. but globally.  And think of power grids mostly being down because they are unable to meet the vastly enhanced power demands, say for air conditioning.

The other factor that's enabled a more rapid heating from global warming, is the reduction of global dimming. The effect was first spotted by Gerry Stanhill, an English scientist working in Israel. Stanhill called the phenomenon 'global dimming', but his research, published in 2001, met with a skeptical response from other climate scientists. It wasn't until several years later that his conclusions were confirmed by Australian scientists using a completely different method to estimate solar radiation, that climate scientists at last woke up to the reality of global dimming.

Dimming appears to be caused by air pollution. This visible air pollution reflects sunlight back into space, preventing it reaching the surface. But the pollution also changes the optical properties of clouds. Because the particles seed the formation of water droplets, polluted clouds contain a larger number of droplets than unpolluted clouds. Recent research shows that this makes them more reflective than they would otherwise be, enhancing albedo and hence offsetting the lowered albedo from Arctic melting.

Stanhill and others estimated that global dimming masked up to one third of global warming for the past twenty -five years. Now that masking is at an end, and we are seeing mean global temperatures ramp up yearly.

We are headed for very "interesting" times indeed, mostly brought about because we paid too much attention to the climate change skeptics and their hacks in the media for too long. Now the planet inherited by our younger generations will likely not be worth living on. But perhaps they will be able to find a new one, based on a working interstellar drive.  If they settle such a world, hopefully they  won't end up trashing it for profit and expedience like their ancestors did to Earth.

One can always hope!

Boiling Under That "Heat Dome"? You Can Thank Global Warming!

Comparison images of Arctic (top) and Antarctic sea ice changes for summer minimum and wniter maximums. (From National Snow and Ice Data Center)

Tens of millions will be baking today with "thermatures" that approach 110 degrees F in some cities, such as Philadelphia. The official meteorological patter is that it's due to a "heat dome".  But most won't go the next step and track it to what it really is: global warming reaching a new dramatic level on this planet.  Why the hesitance? Who knows? But as physicist Michio Kaku noted this morning: "this could be part of a larger trend."

What do we know? As Kaku observed, one single heat dome event can't be pinned on global warming, but the trend or statistical average disclosing enhanced temperatures over larger regions, can. And the fact is that the statistical trend discloses many more such heat dome incidents, over larger and larger areas and lasting longer. As he pointed out this morning, this translates to longer and longer summers, hotter ones and more elderly likely dying because of heat waves - as well as increased strain on limited power supplies.

Now, let's get down to cases. As I noted in previous blogs, e.g. Oct. 21, 2012, Arctic sea ice is more important for Earth's energy balance because when it melts the albedo more rapidly decreases, exposing dark terrain which absorbs more solar radiation which is then trapped by the CO2 blanket. Meanwhile, the melting of Antarctic sea ice each summer largely leaves the energy balance unchanged. I also noted that there is a net loss of sea ice of some 74-75 gigatons per year.

Now,  let's move to the behavior of the Jet Stream in relation to Arctic thermal balance. Dr. Jennifer Francis of Rutgers University last year,  provided cogent scientific evidence that the erosion of Arctic sea ice and land snow resulted in less of the Arctic's cold air being trapped within the Arctic. This means there is less cold air available within the jet stream, at the same time more warm and moist air intrudes from the south. As a direct result of the temperature difference being reduced between the Arctic and mid-latitudes, the Jet Stream has formed large dips and bulges - many of them occurring during the summers and with the dips northward lasting longer - creating your "high pressure heat domes".

Again, no one heat dome points to global warming, but a succession of them over years, emerging as a higher temperature trend, does. Add to this that as the dips form and the affected air is repeatedly slowed, the Jet Stream has a greater tendency to become "stuck".  This sticking in place creates blocking patterns in which heat domes are likely to form with the inevitable heat waves occurring over extended periods of time.

To her credit, Dr. Francis has also pointed to an increased frequency of such blocking patterns, which also show how climate change is impacting our weather.  That such anomalous high pressure domes are increasing ought to therefore terrify every man, woman and child impacted each year. Because as Kaku observed, they will get worse - something first pointed out by David Suzuki in a 1991 book ('It's A Matter Of Survival')  on global warming.

Suzuki observed that extended heat periods would increase in frequency eventually leading to the first "year of no seasons" by which time there'd be no cooler respite at all. He estimated it as beginning from 2040, but the increasing length of summers, the increasing heat dome events and Arctic melting suggest if may arrive as early as 2020.

If people can barely handle it now, what will they do when actual temperatures hit 110F daily and only are down to 95-100F at night, even without humidity factored it? What will they do when so many want to keep cool at any cost that they drain the power grid to a crashing halt? What will happen when the water mains also break, as they have threatened to do in Prince William County,  Maryland (forcing a 5-day shutdown), because our people and politicos pay more attention to an artificial DOW than they do to their own water mains and other corroding infrastructure?

These are questions that remain to be answered.  The problem is we may not like the answers we will soon get!

Mail Call Brane - Readers Seeking Answers!

(Note all the following questions were received in 'comment' format but with the askee requesting no special comment space rather the question(s) collated into one blog ....this one!)

Q. President Obama in response to a question yesterday at his news conference stated that one can't be sure if superstorms such as Sandy are really caused by climate change. What is the take of the climate science community on this? - Roger B., Minneapolis, MN

A. This is a tricky question, and Obama can be forgiven for dodging it in a way at his press conference, because let's face it: most of the press corps possesses the attention span of gnats.

The truth is that one aspect of climate change does show a causal relation to the genesis of Superstorm Sandy. That is the phenomenon known as the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) and its geographical distribution at particular times of the year. The NAO embodies the atmospheric pressure over a particular region (in this case it was the U.S. northeast) and it can be either 'positive' or 'negative'. In the case of the latter, which was what we observed preparatory to Sandy's arrival, the jet stream displayed a pronounced southward dip. In a positive display the jet stream would have more straddled the higher latitudes (e.g. 45N) and not bent so far south.

Now, here's the kicker: research by Charles Greene at Cornell University and other climate scientists has shown that as more Arctic sea ice melts   e.g. in the summer because of global warming (as I noted before, see my blog of  Sept. 21) then the NAO is more likely to be negative, i.e. jet stream sloping way south. This condition then set the stage for a superstorm in two stages: 1) the warm Atlantic water off the eastern U.S. coast fed energy into the system, and 2) the encounter with the cold air ensconced in the southerly jet stream added the energy equivalent of 5 single megaton nuclear bombs to the system and dramatically expanded its reach - incepting the massive destruction we beheld.

We can predict then, that if northerly moving hurricanes become a more common feature, as does a continued negative NAO, then we will see more superstorms like Sandy. The east coast and its cities will then have to decide whether or not it will spend the money, as the UK has, to construct a massive system of dykes etc. to ward off the storm waters, waves. If not, we better have no more wars, because we're going to need all that money for constant rebuilding!

Q. Reading about your brother ('Fighting Cancer, Fighting Your Brother') I can't believe you had to put up with all his crap while you were recovering from prostate cancer! What gives with the dude? Is he 52 cards short of a full deck or just ornery or what? - Mitch C., Stanford, CA

A. Well, what would you think of a guy that once circulated an idea to put all atheists in the country on a "national registry" like sex offenders?  Granted, he had to be saved from himself (he received over 400 death threats via email from outraged atheists across the world) but all that meant is that he shut down the 'Pastor Mike' blog and started a new one ('Straight Talk with Mister Mike'). The bottom line is I don't know what his main problem is, but as I said in blogs from a few years ago, I suspect IF he has mental issues they arise from believing an insane fundamentalist brand of religion. His 'god' - if you can call it that, is totally batshit insane, since it has no problems allowing a son to be killed for mouthing off against parents - as per Deuteronomy 21;18-21, or adulterers (say like Petraeus and Broadwell) to be stoned to death by Deut. 22:22 or chldren to have wild bears set loose on them if they mock "prophets". (By 2 Kings 2: 23-24). Oh, his god also approves of genocide when it means "cleansing the earth" - as in Gen. with the slaughter of the Canaanites.

As I've said many times before, tell me the concept of god in which you believe, and thence the morality you uphold,  and I will forecast your odds of going nuts. Indeed, I can tell how much of a nut you already are. If you accept or believe in batshit crazy gods you will be a batshit crazy person, and likely end up in a straight jacket on thorazine, if not in some other horrendous end.

Q. I read your blogs on prostate cancer with great interest. My husband, age 43,  recently had a biopsy and it came back with four cores at Gleason 3+4. He's in a dilemma as to the treatment but as in your case, the urologist said watchful waiting wasn't an option. He dreads all the post-operative issues to do with surgery including difficulty with sexual relations, but isn't sure about radiation either, and doesn't want to face the prospect of having the cancer come back after having done the radiation. Any ideas, suggestions?  - Marilyn F., New Orleans, LA

A. In the end the choice of treatment is a highly personal one. Apart from the information already given in the blogs, I can only suggest he obtain the two books cited as well: 'The Invasion of the Prostate Snatchers' and John C. Mulhall's  'Saving Your Sex Life: A Guide for Men with Prostate Cancer". (Note: Dr. Mulhall is the Director of the Sexual & Reproductive Medicine Urology Service based at the Memorial Sloan- Kettering Cancer Center.) Mulhall's focus is also highly on the issue of "penile rehabilitation" : http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2012/10/penile-rehabilitiation-what-most-docs.html .

The aversion to post-op problems following surgery is understandable. Incontinence and erection problems are often mentioned (but the solutions to these were given in the blog link, based on Mulhall's book) but the acute or short term problems are also turn-offs for many men: including risk of infections, having a catheter inserted in the bladder for possibly as long as 3 weeks, coping with the pain, constipation arising from use of pain meds, and risk of rectal injury during bowel movements because the rectal wall becomes much thinner following surgery - after removal of the prostate which originally adjoined the rectum. All this is detailed in the UCSF Patient Guide for Radical Prostatectomy which also includes sections dealing with sexual recuperation, other treatments -meds for incontinence, etc.

I chose the high dose rate brachytherapy because: 1) I didn't wish to be laid up weeks with post-op difficulties or catheters, or bowel problems, 2) I didn't want to be possibly faced with months or years of incontinence limiting my travels, freedom, and 3) I didn't want to go to extraordinary lengths for "penile rehabilitation" including having to have an implant operation, or reduced to continually using Viagra, vacuum pumps or injections. But again, each man has to make his own choices!

Q. I found your blog on solar oblateness fascinating, and wondered if you would be so kind as to provide the oblateness formula for the planets from Earth outwards.to Neptune. Thanks! - Mick, Trenton, NJ

A. The oblateness formula depends on the planet's equatorial diameter, a and its polar diameter, b. Then:

f = (a - b)/ a

The values are as follows for Earth outwards to Neptune:

Earth: 1/ 298.257

Mars:  1/ 154.409

Jupiter: 0.06487

Saturn: 0.09796

Uranus:  0.02293

Neptune:  0.0171


Q. If your Aug. 22 blog on 'the biggest spy center on Earth' is to be believed, Gen. Petraeus had much to worry about churning out all those emails. Should he have known about this spook kingdom and how they can scoop up emails, tweets on a whim? Or was he just dumb? - Andy K.,  Tucson, AZ

A. I don't believe the general was 'dumb' but perhaps in the heat of his affair his brain cells didn't process that anything committed to cyberspace or that gets infused into the 'cloud' - is there for years for any spook to grab, save and see. In the blog you referenced, I specifically mentioned (from the cited WIRED piece, 'The Black Box'):

"The mammoth Bluffdale Center will have another important and far more secret role that until now has gone unrevealed. It is also critical for breaking codes. And code-breaking is crucial because of the data that the center will handle: financial information, stock transactions, business deals, foreign military and diplomatic secrets, confidential personal communications, legal documents and anything else initially heavily encrypted."

I also added:  "Everyone's a target, everybody with communications is a target."


So, it boggles the mind that Gen. Petraeus could have been that careless. Also, virtually anyone that spends any time on the net has to be aware that the FBI's "Carnivore" program - for ferreting out emails- is still in play. Also, the 4th amendment protections against extraordinary searches have essentially vanished since the critical provisions of the Patriot Act (mainly to do with wiretapping without the need for warrants) have been extended twice (by Democrats and Repubs - at least it's one thing they can agree on.)

My advice to anyone is that if you don't want the spooks to be amassing all your (saved) Facebook pages, blogs or tweets, then the best step is not to post them. If you don't care, it's no biggie. Btw, for those who want to learn more about the national security state we've erected (to keep us "safe") since 9/11 be sure to get hold of James Bamford's book: The Shadow Factory: The Ultra-Secret NSA from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America.