They don't mention at all what is the likely cause of the heavy snow. For that the NYT would have had to quote, instead of a senator, the National Weather Service.
Fortunately, the truth is out there, it's buried in paragraph 11 of an AP report on the storm, but it is out there. It turns out this is an El Niño year, which means there is more moisture in the jet stream, BUT, in addition to this being an El Niño year, it is also a year of a strong negative Arctic Oscillation, which means cold polar air shifts the jet stream south. Get it? Lots of moisture explained by an occasional occurrence and a southern shift in the polar air explained by an occasional occurrence. Thus, more moisture and colder air means, viola, more snow.
Seth Borenstein the AP reporter who actually reports the simultaneous occurrence of these two events then quotes, now get this, not a U.S. senator but the lead winter weather forecaster at the National Weather Service:
A snowy winter doesn't disprove - or prove - global warming. This is weather, which is variable, not long-term climate, and there is a huge difference.
"This has nothing to do with long-term trends," said Dan Petersen, lead winter weather forecaster at the National Weather Service prediction center in Camp Springs, Md. "This is just a several-week period."
Weather has nothing to do with climate. Hmmm. Isn't that a little like saying microeconomics has nothing to do with macroeconomics? (Consider that a test question to the Austrians.)
ReplyDeleteIsn't climate just the summation of weather over a long period of time? How many rainstorms does it take to make a monsoon? How many blizzards does it take to make an ice age? How long a drought does it take to make a desert?
I think they are trying to create a false dichotomy between weather and climate. It takes more than a few rainstorms, blizzards or droughts to create a monsoon, ice age or desert, but at some point they add up to just that.
If you want to look at climate being a summation of weather, then the period of measurement is probably a long, long time and not a relatively short timeframe (i.e. decades or even more).
ReplyDeleteGiven the violent swings in Earth's climate over geological history it's a mystery to me why people assume these climates should now remain constant, and when they don't that man is to blame and that man can correct any changes. I just don't get it.