Both WUWT and Climate Audit had posts regarding the ridiculous WaPo story about snowfall being a result of climate change.
This is a follow up to those posts done by guest contributor Steven Goddard.
One of the NWF claims about global warming is that snow in the Colorado mountains is diminishing and has become very erratic, as seen in the NWF graphic at left.
In this article I will show that the claim is incorrect – Colorado snowfall has been generally increasing for the last hundred years and that year over year variability has always been extremely high.
Fortunately, there are excellent long term records of snowfall available from NOAA’s Western Regional Climate Center. I chose the Crested Butte, Colorado station because it is centrally located in the mountains (so is representative of a wide region) and has the most complete and continuous snow record of every month for the past 100 years. I have randomly sampled quite a few other stations in Colorado. None seem to have as a complete a record as Crested Butte, and the pattern described for Crested Butte seems to be fairly consistent in the mountainous regions of the state.
Below are graphs showing annual and monthly snowfall totals (in inches) for Crested Butte since 1909. The trend lines were generated using Google Spreadsheet’s linest() function. Note that every month is trending upwards in snowfall and the standard deviation is very high. Also note that there were several very dry years early in the 20th century with very little snow – and the last few decades have seen more consistent snowfall. Since 1981, every year has received more than 100 inches of snow. Prior to 1930, it was not uncommon to have snow years with less than 100 inches of snow. Prior to 1930, the average annual snowfall was 177 inches. Since 1930, the average annual snowfall has been 200 inches – a 10% increase.
Note – the raw data is incorrect for 1910, 1919, and 1924 due to a significant number of missing measurements, so I substituted a calculated annual value based on the trend line. This probably overestimates the snowfall for 1919 and 1924, and is thus conservative.
Click images below for full-sized ones.
Standard deviation = 67 Mean = 195 Trend = +7.7 inches per decade
Mean = 23.4 Standard Deviation = 15.1
Standard deviation = 25.9 Mean = 33.5
Standard deviation = 27.9 Mean = 38.4
Standard deviation = 19.3 Mean = 33.5
Standard deviation = 18.2 Mean = 31.0
Standard deviation = 13.1 Mean = 16.9
In summary, snowfall is increasing annually and we see upward trends in the months of “snowfall season” in Colorado. Year over year variability has always been very high and may actually be lower in recent years. And, the Colorado mountains no longer have extremely low snow years like they did 80 years ago. By the data, it seems the NWF claims are unfounded.
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No, Mike D.
A Gaussian distribution is the mathematically demonstrated distribution of the INDETERMINATE errors in any collection of measurements.
From this, accuracy of a “true value” of a quantity is estimated in terms of a probability.
If that “true value” is the arithmetic mean, then the distribution is called “normal”
That’s all it is
R. Gates (10:50:45) :
Steve Goddard:
“I welcome it. We can all track the progress of how warm 2010 is here:
http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/
January has been remarkably warmer ….
Let’s put it this way, if I were a betting person, I would bet there is far better than even odds chance that 2010 will be the warmest year globally on record. (as measured at sea level up to about 46.000 ft.)”
If January is so warm how come I am looking at four inches of snow, for the second time this winter, here in central North Carolina? It is so blasted cold I am wearing a down parka!
O/T:
There is something very odd indeed about the statement by the Information Commission on its investigation into “Climategate”, the leak of emails from East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit. Gordon Smith, the deputy commissioner, confirms that the university’s refusal to answer legitimate inquiries made in 2007 and 2008 was an offence under S.77 of the Information Act. But he goes on to claim that the Commission is powerless to bring charges, thanks to a loophole in the law – “because the legislation requires action within six months of the offence taking place”.
Careful examination of the Act, however, shows that it says nothing whatever about a time limit. The Commission appears to be trying to confuse this with a provision of the Magistrates Act, that charges for an offence cannot be brought more than six months after it has been drawn to the authorities’ attention – not after it was committed. In this case, the Commission only became aware of the offence two months ago when the emails were leaked – showing that the small group of British and American scientists at the top of the IPCC were discussing with each other and with the university ways to break the law, not least by destroying evidence, an offence in itself.
Wanna bet? Skeptics on Intrade are laying 2 to 1 odds that you’re wrong. https://www.Intrade.com (Click Climate & Weather , under Markets.)
Sorry — above from: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/7113552/Climategate-confusion-over-the-law-in-email-case.html
Steve Goddard (09:58:24) :
” ‘Spring snowpack’ is a favorite worry of AGW types, but is not a particularly important concept any more – because of large reservoirs on the Colorado River which don’t care if the snow melted in May or June.”
Were you speaking of the same Colorado River that not only suffers from pollution and salinity issues, but now also only occasionally reaches the ocean because of diversions and flow modifications?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_River
Or were you speaking of the western U.S. in general, where snow “provides 50 to 80 percent of the year’s water supply”? To say that the timing of snow melt is meaningless to water managers and other stakeholders in the western U.S. is most certainly incorrect.
http://www.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/factpub/aib536.html
And some nice, juicy peer-reviewed papers for the technically inclined:
http://wwa.colorado.edu/admin/announcement_files/2794-uploaded/announcement-2794-8629.pdf
http://tenaya.ucsd.edu/~dettinge/swe_over_p_attribution.pdf
Hu McCulloch (10:54:16) says “What is ridiculous is not the suggestion that heavy snows and cold winters are due to “climate change,” but that they are due to global warming.”
More ridiculous are claims that they are the result of _anthropogenic_ global warming. Even more ridiculous is that they are due to CO2-related AGW.
It is amazing how many people, and scientists, slip back and forth without thinking between global warming and climate change; between climate change and human-induced climate change; and between human climate change from all sources and actions and climate change from anthropogenic CO2 and GHG.
Some newpaper and TV journalists manage to jump all the way from any sign of weather or climate change all the way to “it’s due to the CO2 we are adding to the atmosphere”, with no evidence for the many steps of the chain in between.
They cannot make up their minds which way to make a mountain out of a molehill.
Carbon Oddball Weather is the new theory of screwy wabbit AGW.
They get an F on their paper for having a COW.
I think the thing to bear in mind is if there is less snow it is a sign of Global Warming. But if there is more snow it is a sign of Global Warming. Of course snowfall might remain much the same in which case that is a sign of Global Warming.
In addition we have to remember that more snow is bad. Less snow is also bad and much the same amount of snow is bad as well. We’ve got to do something about it.
If there is more snow we have to reduce it. If there is less we have to increase it. If it stays the same then we have to do something to change it to stop the world coming to an end.
“Phil M (13:17:03) :
“The plural of anecdote is not data.”
I hope this sentiment will be echoed here when the “weather is not climate” department makes its inevitable return, and folks begin piling on about how cool it has been in their area.”
Hey! When anecdotal evidence is good enough for the IPCC, it’s good enough for us:
“mercurior (13:49:23) :
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/7111525/UN-climate-change-panel-based-claims-on-student-dissertation-and-magazine-article.html
“
R. Gates (09:48:41) :
“In the final analysis of the proof or lack thereof of global warming, the snowpack levels at Crested Butte Colorado mean nothing.”
================
well put, but then you just had to do some trolling, eh.
R. Gates (11:28:30) :
Some of you should put your political blinders aside, and really understand the science behind this. Greater snowfall at Crested Butte could actually PROVE global warming (though I don’t think it’s actually relevant at all).
It also proves we are heading into an Ice Age with “warmer winters” and “cooler summers”
Warmer winters allow for more snow to fall. As you stated when the atmosphere is warmer it has a greater ability to hold water vapor and therefore more snow is produced. But it is the cooler summers that let that additional snow and ice to accumulate.
So far here in NC we had a very cool summer in 2009 ( 4F below normal for the highs) and a snowy winter – rather unusual for recent times.
Off topic, but apparently the Stern report was ‘changed’ after pubishing because of dodgy data dources….
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/7111618/Stern-report-was-changed-after-being-published.html
R Shearer (13:02:08) :
“And I agree with Henry Chance, that the use of the term carbon by AGW proponents is ignorant. CO2 is the correct term.”
Depending on the context, carbon dioxide may indeed be the appropriate term. But other GHG contain carbon, e.g. methane. So one could correctly refer to those gases as “carbon” for brevity’s sake.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_cycle
Ref – Gail Combs (13:42:49) :
R. Gates (10:50:45) :
Steve Goddard:
“If January is so warm how come I am looking at four inches of snow, for the second time this winter, here in central North Carolina? It is so blasted cold I am wearing a down parka!”
_________________
It’s just a local blip, ignore it and it will go away:-)
Isn’t “weather” a local phenom? If the snow pack here and there really is being reduced, doen’t that mean the difference will probably show up somewhere else, like North Carloina? Wouldn’t we expect to see less of something here and more of something there if climate is changing? Ok? Now which way is the change moving? Cooler or not?
“Dr. Amanda Staudt provides scientific expertise for the National Wildlife Federation’s activities on global warming. Prior to joining NWF, Dr. Staudt directed the National Academies of Science Climate Research Committee and helped author more than a dozen reports on topics including the U.S. strategy for supporting climate change research, radiative forcing of climate, past records of surface temperature, and practices for effective global change assessments.” http://bit.ly/aFipwj
“We are nearing the end of a minimum in the 11-year solar cycle during which the Earth is receiving slightly less heat from the Sun,” Amanda Staudt… http://bit.ly/chBys7
“If it seems like we’re getting more heavy storms, it’s because we are. Warmer air simply can hold more moisture, so heavier precipitation is expected in the years to come,” she said during a national teleconference… http://bit.ly/9OfzxS
“The big picture is that global warming is putting hurricanes on steroids.” http://bit.ly/9HuedQ
“The massive wildfires raging in California this summer are symptomatic of a trend toward more fires burning larger areas in the Western United States over the past few decades,” said Dr. Amanda Staudt, climate scientist, National Wildlife Federation. “Global warming can explain part of this trend,” Dr. Staudt said, “because it is feeding longer fire seasons, drier conditions, and more lightning”… http://bit.ly/9qz6YU
The frequency of torrential rainstorms in the Midwest has jumped 20 percent since the late 1960s, according to Amanda Staudt… http://bit.ly/9vBCci
Excuse me while I interrupt your attempt to re-educate the stubborn Mr/Ms Gates, but I think you may be interested in Christopher Booker’s take on the excuses as to why there can be no prosecution of the miscreants at the UEA.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/7113552/Climategate-confusion-over-the-law-in-email-case.html
Could this be the start of Climategate-gate?
R. Gates, your warming is buried in weather pattern variations. If you choose not to study the how and why of weather pattern variations, you will know nothing about your warming. A scientist worth a damn studies and understands the basics first and foremost. Hansen has not, based on what he has published so far. He has studied what you think should be studied, thus making the same basic science mistake you apparently are willing to do.
In my career, I had to extract synaptic brainstem responses from the general cacophony of pseudo-random electric synaptic signals one can pick up via electrodes on the surface of the skin covering your head. To do that, I had to understand, at a critical level, the cacophonic noise.
In picking out a warming signal from the cacophony of weather pattern variation, which is not randomly balanced, you must do the same. That you choose not to, simply means that your pomposity, which dripped from every word of your post, will trip you up, mark my words young man.
And at the same time, keep my hair and makeup freshly in place. Idiot.
RE Mark T 12:23;18 1/30,
Ahem, please check out the legendary C. W. McCall, “Ballad of Wolf Creek Pass,”
http://www.24listen.com/xC_onLPc-0E/c.-w.-mccall-wolf-creek-pass/
Intrade uses the GISS data, which is updated monthly here: http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/
So sock it to those know-nothings on Intrade! (Or alert your betting buddies to the opportunity.)
You left out multi-decadal oceanic oscillations (PDO, etc.)
In case it hasn’t been linked before, The Australian newspaper is running with the story on the non-peer reviewed references in the IPCC documentation:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/dont-trust-the-weathermans-forecasts/story-e6frg6zo-1225824634542
See:
http://arcweb.natice.noaa.gov/dailyproduct.web/daily_launch.htm
Appears you can now walk from Norway to Denmark using Google Earth or Silverlight.
Also using the Silverlight image which gives totals:
14,026,430 km2 (January 30, 2010) for > 8/10 extent
whereas IARC-JAXA shows ice extent at
13,199,531 km2 (January 29, 2010)
@ur momisugly Mike D. (11:23:53)
Followed your link; interesting analysis there. I agree with the comment someone made about the elevation of the sites you selected, however. That variable (elevation) needs to be accounted for before one could say there hasn’t been ANY change in SWE. Variability in SWE at low elevations might not have a dramatic impact on water management, but could have serious ecological implications in addition to impacts on recreation in the area. Also, though I know this wasn’t part of your analysis, it’s also possible that other climatic variables (e.g. temperature) could be affecting the timing and amount of runoff, which would also be crucial to water managers and stakeholders.
Lastly, SNOTEL is operated by the NRCS. USACE and others assist with and supplement measurements, but by and large most work is done by NRCS employees.
Wonderful Glaciergate/Hitler spoof, probably mentioned elsewhere but really nicely done and worth watching :
[Anthony says no more embedded Hitler spoofs. Post the URL and people can click on it if they want. This particular one has been around for a while. ~dbs, mod]