From The Declining Spring Snowcover Department
Experts tell us that spring snowcover has seen rapid declines in the Northern Hemisphere over the last 20 years. As of today, western US snowpack averaged by state is 137 percent of normal.
According to USDA Snotel measurements, Arizona is 446% of normal. California is 131% of normal. New Mexico is 184% of normal. Nevada is 126% of normal. Montana is 104% of normal.
Lake Powell water levels have risen four feet in the last month and are 56 feet higher than they were on this date in 2005.
http://lakepowell.water-data.com/graphingengine.php?graphing=1+back_days=150
Salt Lake City just had its latest spring snow on record. Mammoth is expecting a big Memorial Day snow storm.
The Obama administration (42% approval) forecasts heat and drought for the western US. Let’s see how they are doing!
http://www.hprcc.unl.edu/products/maps/acis/wrcc/WaterTDeptWRCC.png
http://www.hprcc.unl.edu/products/maps/acis/wrcc/WaterPNormWRCC.png
Apparently Arnie’s efforts to stop global warming have been successful.
Schwarzenegger has emerged as a national leader on global warming, the one whose name most frequently comes up in foreign capitals when international cooperation on reducing carbon emissions is discussed. Al Gore might have a Nobel Prize, but Schwarzenegger heads a state that, if it were a country, would rank among the 10 biggest economies in the world. Given the Bush administration’s unwillingness to seriously address the problem, Schwarzenegger’s initiatives to mandate hard emissions targets and set up carbon-trading schemes with other states and Canadian provinces make him this country’s most forward-thinking governor, and its greenest Republican.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
And in a a few years time after the climate has swung into its cold phase and temperatures decline the headlines will read.
“All of our efforts to curb emissions and reduce the effects of Manmade Global Warming are now coming into fruition. You guys ought to deify us as we just saved your sorry ass.”
Believe me, these people have no shame.
The polar bears are singing “California here I come!”.
Nik:
Curbing emissions would imply a reduction in the rate of increase of CO2. I’m willing to bet it will be hardly affected. Of course, alarmists will likely turn around and declare cooling to be bad, and somehow caused by CO2.
Yes. Fine. But how much of it is old snow?
More seriously, this is great news. Looks like those above normal snowpacks are where the meltwaters will be needed.
It’s the first time in more than 50 years that Sacramento has experienced such a cold spell this late in the season. As long as the AO index remains negative there will be no NH warming.
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/ao_index.html
This surely accounts for The Warmest April in history.
Averaging state percentages doesn’t seems like a good way to Western snow cover – they are all different sizes. The first link doesn’t do it this way, so the comparison is invalid.
I think I have understood why IPCC likes a global temperature.
If you average NH and SH, you get rid of much of the cyclic pattern……and it becomes more difficult to see whats really going on.
Still unusually good snow at Cairngorm mountain in Scotland after record winter snow fall
http://www.cairngormmountain.co.uk/
So obviously the warmest start to the year Globally has missed out Scotland. And the rest of the UK. And Western Europe. And the USA. And Much of China And….
Wait a minute then, just where has it been so warm elsewhere that a record is being claimed? The Southern Hemisphere must surely have melted to compensate for the lack of warmth in much of the Northern Hemisphere.
Couldn’t have anything to do with the tiny number of stations in Canada artificially skewing the temperature in the World’s second largest country could it?
Tonyb
Welp…
Sounds like everything is right on target as per AGW computer model predictions : More snowfall… lots and lots of snowfall… so much snowfall that it will have to be measured in feet, not inches… and it will be unprecidented.
They sure showed us, didn’t they ?
And when all that precipitation translates into unprecidented amounts of heavy rainfall in the summer months, they’ll tell us that the models predicted that too.
And then when everyone drops dead from drought and lack of drinking water, they’ll tell us the models predicted that too…
And if at anytime during these high precipitations, (side by side with droughts), should there arise a cooling period somewhere in mix for any period of time, the models will have seen that coming as well.
But the cooling period will only be temporary because the models say so. And after 10, 20, 30 years of cooling and global temps dropping by how much they’ve increased thus far, we’ll suddenly jump right smack dab into catastrophic global warming and unprecidented snowfalls, rainfalls, droughts, etc.
On the other hand…
If we don’t see this predicted cooling period for whatever reason, the models were then also correct in their catastrophic runaway venus-like warming too.
So you see, 30-year temporary cooling can run side by side with runaway heating… and heavy precipitation can run side by side with drought.
Hope that clears up any confusion some of you may have !
And on the news tonight (I live in California) the story is that May precipitation is below normal so expect reduced water deliveries. Go figure. This has been one of the coldest months of May I can remember since moving here. Daytime highs have been some 20 degrees below average many days. Tomorrow’s high is currently forecast to be 58F and 63F the day after. It is nearly June and I live in San Jose. It should be in the 80’s by now.
That increased snow pack in California might be more due to colder temperatures than increased precipitation. Tioga Pass through Yosemite is still closed. Highway 108 (Sonora Pass) is still closed a little South of Yosemite. Most years the pass opens in May but there is one opening recorded as late as July 1. That might have been due to road repairs, though, and not snowpack. 1998 was one heck of a winter, though. We got some 15 inches of rain in one series of storms around New Years Day that flooded parts of Cupertino and San Jose that winter.
Reply: The closure till July 1st was due to snowpack. I drove through Tioga pass on that July 1st. It was a good thing to, otherwise I would have had to drive the long way through Reno instead to visit my family on vacation in the Eastern Sierra. The scenery as magnificent that day.~ ctm
The Obama administration (42% approval) forecasts heat and drought for the western US.
That pretty much guarantees more snow in the offing…
Doesn’t matter. It’s all rotten snow!
😉
Yep, and Actic sea ice is back to average, right? Honestly, how hard is it to grasp the concept of “trend”? How can you think an anomaly negates a twenty-year trend?
Also, citing a study showing declining snow cover in the Northern hemisphere and disproving it by touting the western part of the United States is ludicrous. This is like saying, “Are you sure there’s only a one in six chance of rolling a six? Well, well, well, look at this – I’ve just rolled a die three times, and got two sixes. Now, I don’t know about all that fancypants statistics stuff, but I’m pretty confident that two in three is more like 67 per cent, not 17. Those statistician clowns really have no shame, shouldn’t they learn basic arithmetic first?”
But of course you all know now (because I’m telling you) that more snow means Global Warming (because the warming causes more evaporation, more precipitation and hence more snow). And if the ice caps grow any more this year then that’s ‘case closed’ as far as I’m concerned. Just what will it take to convince you Denialismists? Do we have to be buried under 20 feet of ice before you’ll believe in Global Warming?[/sarc]
Ross M says:
May 25, 2010 at 11:25 pm
Averaging state percentages doesn’t seems like a good way to Western snow cover – they are all different sizes. The first link doesn’t do it this way, so the comparison is invalid.
—–
You’ve seen Anthony’s figures now let us see yours.
Thats odd
Rutgers shows neither a positive or negative departure of snow cover in the continental US??!! Lots of negative departure everywhere else though…
http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/chart_daily.php?ui_year=2010&ui_day=144&ui_set=2
Don’t know why Cal’ doesn’t join the EU.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7136639.ece
Afterall Arnie is Austrian by birth.
That data looks like saying that there is a large anomaly in the SW (Arizona, NM and the gambling state), a reasonable one in California but slightly below elsewhere.
As one assumes that the SW snowpack is the smallest at this time of year, I’d ask what the actual anomaly is in terms of cubic metres of snowpack across the Rockies?
Suspect not a lot or, if anything, slightly down.
Interested to hear answers to that one…..
California Uber Alles!
They were still skiing in the Scottish Highlands last week, the latest in the year in recorded history.
The rise in Lake Powel is good new for Vegas. Is there any info about the Utah salt planes, which periodically become lakes again? Time to prepare the sandbags in Salt lake City?
I must be getting old. I remember when California was sixth largest, hands down, no debate. Now Kalifornia is merely ‘among the top ten,’ and I strongly suspect that’s a slight fudging of the old info rather than a reporting based on the current figures.
Wasn’t it nice of Kalifornia to show the rest of the United States what happens when you follow those European social and environmental policies, even take the lead sometimes?
“Experts tell us that spring snowcover has seen rapid declines in the Northern Hemisphere over the last 20 years. As of today, western US snowpack averaged by state is 137 percent of normal.”
How large a fraction of the Northern Hemisphere comprises the western US?
Why suggest this fraction is 100%?
May 2010 in Holland was very cool. What does it suggest about hemispheric or global temperature? Nothing at all, of course. This cool May is just weather. So is snowcover this spring in that part of the US. Northern hemisphere snowcover has dropped far below normal, no?
Of course, everyone on this forum knows all this. So what is the motive for all this silliness? Could it be you are all trying to be first laughed at, then totally forgotten in order to give Al Gore en Kyoto uncriticisable freeway?
Looks like we could be seeing ‘homogenised’ and ‘adjusted’ figures. For our own benefit, of course, to make sure there is no ‘faulty research’. I recomend the best way to avoid ‘faulty research’ is to never let anyone see the raw data, and only show the ‘adjusted’ data. In extreme circumstances, you can delete the original data and claim it has been lost.
—
Unless of course snow cover went the other way. ;o)