The folly of blaming the Eastern U.S. heat wave on global warming

Watts up with That? ^ | July 7, 2012 | Anthony Watts

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

A picture is worth a thousand words:

It isn’t global.

The is weather, not climate. It is caused by a persistent blocking high pressure pattern. In a day or two, that red splotch over the eastern USA will be gone.

Image from Dr. Ryan N. Maue of WeatherBELL
h/t to Joe Bastardi

UPDATE: Dr. Roy Spencer puts it in perspective

June 2012 U.S. Temperatures: Not That Remarkable

July 6th, 2012

I know that many journalists who lived through the recent heat wave in the East think the event somehow validates global warming theory, but I’m sorry: It’s summer. Heat waves happen. Sure, many high temperature records were broken, but records are always being broken.

And the strong thunderstorms that caused widespread power outages? Ditto.

Regarding the “thousands” of broken records, there are not that many high-quality weather observing stations that (1) operated since the record warm years in the 1930s, and (2) have not been influenced by urban heat island effects, so it’s not at all obvious that the heat wave was unprecedented. Even if it was the worst in the last century for the Eastern U.S. (before which we can’t really say anything), there is no way to know if it was mostly human-caused or natural, anyway.

“But, Roy, the heat wave is consistent with climate model predictions!”. Yeah, well, it’s also consistent with natural weather variability. So, take your pick.

For the whole U.S. in June, average temperatures were not that remarkable. Here are the last 40 years from my population-adjusted surface temperature dataset, and NOAA’s USHCN (v2) dataset (both based upon 5 deg lat/lon grid averages; click for large version):

Certainly the U.S drought conditions cannot compare to the 1930s.

I really tire of the media frenzy which occurs when disaster strikes…I’ve stopped answering media inquiries. Mother Nature is dangerous, folks. And with the internet and cell phones, now every time there is a severe weather event, everyone in the world knows about it within the hour. In the 1800s, it might be months before one part of the country found out about disaster in another part of the country. Sheesh.

[GregoTX]

A National Environmental Tax and Global Climate Change Tax would fix that ya know. But we shouldn’t have to pay the tax, lets tax the rich. Then we planted will not burn up and we will be saved.

[nascarnation]

1936 had a sh!tload of 100 degree days here in Indiana.
I suppose that was global warming too, LOL.

[Marine_Uncle]

"I know that many journalists who lived through the recent heat wave in the East think the event somehow validates global warming theory, but I’m sorry: It’s summer. Heat waves happen."
There are one heck of a lot of freaking dopes wondering around making claims at being journalist.

[Reeses]

Maybe God has a sense of humor. The Washington DC crowd wants to remake America into Cuba? Here is some Cuban heat and third world power outages to enjoy the socialist unemployment.

[Bernard Marx]

Every time a destructive storm hits there's a major fact that's never mentioned by the climate Cassandras. Big storms, floods and fires now cause historically high dollar damage and deaths simply because there are more people. They live in areas that in the past were isolated and unpopulated.

If an earthquake of the same intensity as the 1906 San Francisco quake hit the same area today the damage and loss of life would be almost incalculable. Ditto the New Madrid region which was relatively unpopulated in 1812 compared to today. The same concept applies to the impact of droughts and all the other calamities mentioned by the global warming zealots.

[FlingWingFlyer]

All weather is local.

[FlingWingFlyer]

Big storms, floods and fires now cause historically high dollar damage and deaths simply because there are more people. They live in areas that in the past were isolated and unpopulated.

You nailed it. Also, people are now living in areas where people only 50 years ago would have called you stupid for building a house there.

[Sherman Logan]

Righto. Used to live in Sacramento. There’s a huge floodplain between downtown and the airport. 25 years ago it was under 10 feet of water.

About 15 years ago they rezoned it and now it is residential, retail and light commercial. Nothing at all changed about the terrain, except that they don’t maintain the levees as well as they used to.

When the inevitable happens and there is tens or hundreds of milliions of dollars of damage, it will be taken as evidence of man-caused climate change.

[cripplecreek]

I’m just glad its breaking. Down to 84 degrees in southern Michigan now and its a relief.

My dogs are loving it. Its even been too hot for them.

[justa-hairyape]

Their climate models actually get a few weeks right for a small area of the planet, and they jump for joy. That is what you call, desperation.

[justa-hairyape]

And in one of our ancestors home countries, the exact opposite is happening.

Britain facing its “worst ever” summer

Britain is facing its “worst ever” summer with cold wet weather ruining family holidays and blighting the Olympics, forecasters warned last night.

August is set to be a washout following a miserable July and the wettest June and April since records began – meaning summer is effectively over.

[Ouderkirk]

I’m kind of an “all in” kind of guy. If it’s summer I want it hot...90’s like and some rain here and there to keep things growing.

If it’s winter I want it to be cold. 10’s - 20’s every day is fine. A few feet of snow that comes and never leaves from the weekend after Thanksgiving to St. Patrick’s day works for me.

Obviously that’s not the way it works. Everyone has their lifetime of experiences. Here in Western/Central NY I can recall hot summers, and not so hot summers. I can recall the summer of ‘76 when it was 46 degrees in the middle of July. A few years later...it’s a new record for that very same day! We’ve had winter’s where there was little ot no snow, and mild temps in the 40’s every day, to the winter of 2000-2001 where the snow cam the weekend after Thanksgiving and Stayed to St. Patricks’s Day.

Now... I watch the bouys on Lake Ontario. Surface temps in the middle of the lake are the best predictor of the coming season.

Rarely, do we get hot days until the surface temp in the middle of the lake reaches 70 degrees. When it does then it’s in the 90’s. Once the lake “turns over” and the temp

If the water warms very fast in the spring...it’s going to be a hot one like this year.

Two years ago it never hit 70 degrees until two weeks before labor day. We had a couple of hot days then, and then we had a storm that turned over the lake, and summer was don on labor day.

http://www.wunderground.com/MAR/buoy/2010/9/5/45012.html?graphtype=1

You can see...the summer was over and we had a cold winter.

Last year you can see where ther was a slow decline in the water temps, the fall was beautiful and th is past winter was mild.

http://www.wunderground.com/MAR/buoy/2011/9/5/45012.html?graphtype=1

http://www.wunderground.com/MAR/buoy/45012.html

What will the coming winter look like? Have to wait until labor day to find out.

[Inyo-Mono]

It is crasy Ernest. As I mentioned on another thread a couple of days ago, All weather is local; i.e.; we just experienced our lowest high temp for the 4th of July - 89 degrees, when it is normally over 100 here on that date.