As you can tell from my previous blog posts, I am really concerned about deliberately deceptive media stories and false information being distributed by certain groups.
Well, tall tale distributors have been working overtime recently, suggesting that the poor January snowpack over the Northwest is mainly the result of human-caused global warming.
These claims are demonstrably false.
Yesterday, the Seattle Times had a story, which stated:
The record-low snowpack is mostly due to how warm the West has been, which is connected to climate change from the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas, several scientists said.
Public Radio Station KUOW is on the same page as the Seattle Times, noting that:
With the global climate changing rapidly due to fossil fuel pollution, scientists say we should expect more warm winters like this one.
I could give you another dozen of these, but you get the drift: global warming "advocates" are jumping all over the lack of mid-winter snowfall, claiming the warming from increasing CO2 concentrations gave us a dry, warm month that resulted in minimal snowfall.
It is easy to show that these claims are false.
The warm, dry January was produced by a very strong (and unusual) upper-level high-pressure area (see below), with colors indicating the difference from normal. Red colors are crazy high pressure.
There is no evidence that global warming causes more high-pressure systems in winter over the region.
For example, climate model simulations don't predict them.
Would you like more proof? Below is a plot of sea-level pressure on the Washington Coast over the last 30 years at Quillayute, on the northwest Washington coast.
No upward trend in high pressure in winter.
But I can disprove the global-warming explanation for the lack of January snow in other ways.
If we plot the January precipitation totals on the western slopes of the Cascades since the late 1800s (below), there is no long-term trend. There would be if global warming were building high-pressure ridges more frequently over our region
A slow increase by about 2F over the period, with several Januaries being warmer than this year (such as 1981). This modest warming is NOT the explanation for this January's low snowfall.
Finally, to really put the global warming claims to rest, here are the April 1 snowpack totals over the Northwest mountains. Only a minimal decline over time.
The bottom line is this: the poor January snowpack over the region was predominantly associated with an unusual, persistent, high-pressure area over the region, not global warming.
The slowly warming planet is only a minor contributor to the snow deficit (perhaps 1-10% of the deficit).
The claims by some of the media regarding the global warming origin of the poor January snow are more than disappointing; they represent deliberate misinformation.
Announcement
Snowpack obviously isn't great right now, but 2004-2005 and 2014-2015 were lower at this time, so not a record low and lets not even bring 76-77 into the conversation. Incoming systems over the next week will add to the snowpack-almost two months to the median peak for most basins.
ReplyDeleteI remember the dry winter of 76/77. My goodness. We were at Paradise, Mt. Rainier in mid winter walking around in our street shoes. And to think that the very same spot recorded a 1,224 inches of snow in 71/72--A world record according to The Guinness Book
DeleteGreat post Cliff.
ReplyDeleteAnd, using data from a variety of sources, we had no snow years in 1958, 1970, 1983 and 1984, 1988, 1992, 2004 and several others.
Interestingly enough, following, within 1 to 3 years, we had a spike in local snowfall. Usually massively so.
Using only the most recent years so as to not throw off the Chicken Littles; 1986, (famously) 2008 and most recently, 2018.
That trend flows all the way back to records from 1958.
Using those reference points as our guides, somewhere between this next winter of 2026 / 27 and the winter of 2029 / 30.....the region should very probably up their spending on snow plows, and perhaps start building a few salt sheds in anticipation.
It's misleading to call a 2 degrees rise in temperature "slight". Probably more significant is the 1.8 Fahrenheit rise in ocean temperatures. These large and increasing changes will cause many unusual events. It is difficult to attribute individual events to climate change, it's even more difficult and harmful to say that climate change is not a contributor.
ReplyDeleteWho is calling it slight?
Delete"These large and increasing changes will cause many unusual events."
DeletePlease explain how it is you know that. And don't leave out any details - we want to have the same thorough understanding that you have.
What i interpret from this post is that Dr Mass has shown climate change did not cause the dry spell as that was a naturally occuring, not unprecedented at all, high pressure anomaly BUT that climate change IS a slight (1-10%) contributor to the lower snowpack which is also seen as contributing to a very minimal decline in snowpack over the years. Certainly it would be remiss of any scientist not to mention climate change as even a minor contributor . Dr Mass acknowledges the contribution of climate change but almost always shows that the sky certainly isn't falling like some would lead us to believe. At the same time it is extremely reckless to blame every weather event (extreme or not) on climate change, full stop. Unfortunately that's what some of the media does and its misleading and not scientific at all.
DeleteLet it be a lesson on how easily we are fooled.
ReplyDeleteFor myself I wonder at how little attention is given to how resourceful we have been at responding to our changing needs.
I would be interested to know the particulars of the temperature measurements presented above for the Cascades, including uncertainty values.
ReplyDeleteBut what about the "snow drought" that occurred 164,872 years ago? Did the Seattle Times forget about that?
ReplyDeleteWhat do you make of today's news of the Trump administration's decision to no longer regulate greenhouse gases and other contributors to climate change? That seems worthy of its own blog entry, one would imagine?
ReplyDeleteIf Cliff Mass is right that climate change isn't a problem, then that seems like the right move. Why sacrifice resources and economic growth to stop something with no real effect?
DeleteRe Richard DuBois: "It's misleading to call a 2 degrees rise in temperature "slight". Probably more significant is the 1.8 Fahrenheit rise in ocean temperatures."
ReplyDeleteWhat is your source for the increase in ocean temperature. The oceans have a massive thermal capacity and the floating buoy systems used to sample temperature to thousand of meters register changes in hundredths of a degree. You must be referring ocean surface temperature which can be highly volatile.
Don't care for cold or snow, local infrastructure not tuned for it. Heck apartment I used to live in, had no insulation at all. It was determined. Heard rats in the walls at night
ReplyDelete