From NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center and “Earth’s thermostat”
A train of developing tropical low pressure areas stretch from the Eastern Pacific Ocean into the Central Pacific and they were captured in an image from NOAA’s GOES-West satellite on August 1. The train of five tropical lows include the remnants of Tropical Storm Genevieve and newly developed Tropical Storm Iselle.
![atrainof5tro[1]](https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/atrainof5tro1.jpg?quality=83)
NOAA manages the GOES-West and GOES-East satellites. Data from the satellites are used to create images and animations from NASA/NOAA’s GOES Project at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.
System 91C
The western-most tropical low pressure area lies to the west of Genevieve’s remnants. That low is designated as System 91C. At 0600 UTC (2 a.m. EDT), the center of System 91C was located near 12.0 north latitude and 167.3 west longitude, about 850 miles southwest of Honolulu, Hawaii. 91C has a low chance of developing into a tropical depression over the next couple of days.
East of System 91C lie Genevieve’s remnants. NOAA’s Central Pacific Hurricane Center (CPHC) issued the final warning on Post-tropical cyclone Genevieve on July 31 at 1500 UTC (11 a.m. EDT). At that time it was centered near 13.0 north latitude and 151.1 west longitude, about 1,255 miles east of Johnston Island. It was moving west.
Genevieve’s Remnants
At 8 a.m. EDT on August 1, Genevieve’s remnant low center was located about 500 miles south-southeast of Hilo, Hawaii. CPHC noted the atmospheric conditions are only marginally favorable for its redevelopment over the next few days as it moves westward near 10 mph.
System 96E
Continuing east, System 96E is tracking behind Genevieve’s remnants. System 96E is another developing low pressure area with a minimal chance for becoming a tropical depression. The CPHC gives System 96E a 10 percent chance of development over the next two days. It is located in the Eastern Pacific Ocean, about 1,275 miles east-southeast of the Big Island of Hawaii. Satellite imagery shows the low is producing minimal shower activity. CPHC noted that upper-level winds are currently not conducive for development, but they could become a little more favorable in a few days while the low moves westward at around 10 mph.
Tropical Storm Iselle
Behind System 96E is the only developed tropical cyclone, Tropical Storm Iselle. Iselle is located east-northeast of System 96E. Tropical storm Iselle was born on July 31 at 2100 UTC (5 p.m. EDT). On August 1, Iselle’s maximum sustained winds were already up to 60 mph (95 kph). At 5 a.m. EDT (2 a.m. PDT/0900 UTC).the center of Tropical Storm Iselle was located near latitude 13.5 north and longitude 124.6 west. Iselle is centered about 1,160 miles (1,870 km) west-southwest of the southern tip of Baja California, Mexico.
Fifth Area of Low Pressure
The fifth tropical low pressure area is east-southeast of Iselle. That area is a tropical wave that is producing disorganized showers and thunderstorms. That wave is located several hundred miles south-southwest of Manzanillo, Mexico. The National Hurricane Center noted that environmental conditions are conducive for gradual development of this system during the next several days while it moves westward at 10 mph. NHC gives this low a 30 percent chance of becoming a tropical depression over the next two days.
RE: JKrob says:
August 1, 2014 at 4:48 pm
If the system was as closed as you envision the net effect of such storms would be warming. What goes up must come down, and the air that was cooled by rising would be warmed by sinking, but it would also contain all the latent heat released by precipitating the water out of humid air. In other words, a hurricane would have the effect of Chinook winds descending from a mountain range.
I have actually read about meteorological conditions that do have this effect. In the dead of night you can get a down-burst of hot, dry winds. I read of an occasion out in the Great Plains where temperatures shot up into the 90’s around midnight.
However that is the exception to the rule. In most cases the air descending from a thundershower is refreshingly cooler. Around here, during a heat wave, a single shower can briefly drop the temperatures from 95 to 75.
Can you explain where the heat has gone, using your own vision of how things work? I actually confess to an inability to fully grasp why thundershowers are cooling and a Chinook is warming.
I can recall a couple times when, in the Atlantic, a long string of innocuous-looking lows like this all became tropical storms. As a young man it seemed very exciting to have four or five storms rolling across the Atlantic from Africa towards the East Coast of the USA, because I was bored and thought life would be improved by a little mayhem. (My opinions have changed with aging.) I was bitterly disappointed when they all curved out to sea, and also competed with each other for the available heat.
Some of the worst hurricanes have been loners, during seasons where there were not all that many storms.
Greg Goodman says:
August 1, 2014 at 7:58 pm
“…ENSO meter is dropping rapidly towards zero right now….”
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It is good to point this out.
A significant El Nino this year looks more remote. I guess that the Team is not liklng that one little bit.
Even the UK Met Office are beginning to forecast that global temperatures will remain flat for the next 5 years (about 18 months ago, they were suggesting that the return to warming would be 2017), and last year Julia Slingo (their chief scientist), at a warmist conference, even suggested that they were not out of the woods yet, since warming might not return before 2030, ie., for about 16 or 17 years!.
It appears that the warmist are begiining to acknowledge the existence of the pause, and eren that it may continue for some time (say through to 2019 or even through to 2030), but they are in denial as to what that implies regarding real world climate sensitivity.
It looks like it will be an interesting ride ahead..
Settled Science?
As I read through this thread and observed that several people have wildly different ideas on what a tropical storm or a hurricane does with respect to heat, I was again reminded that mankind does not fully understand the atmosphere and its mechanics. There is no settled science on nearly anything having to do with climate. I am not even sure that we could get a consensus on what causes lapse rate.
My point is that mankind’s understanding of how our weather system works is still in the dark ages and the IPCC is plain wrong to suggest that science has reached a point where we can project changes occurring from a vanishingly small change in the gas mixture of the planet.
Side Note: I have to go to a meeting in Daytona on Tuesday just as this storm (what will it be then?) is projected to pass by. To exaggerate a bit, I’ll be driving into harms way! 🙂
And whilst these storms ravish, how much DWLWIR is prevented from entering the oceans?
In these conditions, the very top surface of the ocean is skinned off, and becomes a divorced layer of water droplets ravinging above the ocean, and much of which is swept upwards into the clouds, never to directly return to the ocean below.
These droplets (not water vapour) are more than a few microns in diameter, and since, due to the omnidirectional nature of DWLWIR about 80% of all DWLWIR is absorbed in just 3 or 4 microns of water, they act as an effective LWIR block, absorbing the DWLWIR before it has an opportunity to find its way into the ocean below.
It would appear that the absorption of the DWLWIR by these droplets powers evaporation and helps carry the resultant vapour upwards to the height of the clouds.
Whilst the effect of this may not be substantial when considring the globe on a 24/7 basis, it may be significant when looking for a small energy imbalance in ocean energy uptake. One reason why Trenbeth cannot find his missing heat in the oceans, may be because the energy that he thinks went into the oceans, in fact never went into the oceans. Some of that energy was absorbed by water droplets in storm conditions, and never found its way into the oceans, but instead remained in the atmosphere (indeed, it was carried to height help fueling the tropical cyclones and thunderstorms).
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Watch in real time
http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/surface/level/orthographic=-145.52,12.12,512
Joel O’Bryan says:
August 1, 2014 at 10:22 pm
I wrote, “From NOAA Weekly ENSO update 28 July slide 7 and slide 8 shows it is moving northward in the NH ITCZ while the SH ITCZ is rapidly cooling.”
Joel, it’s the ITCZ. There are not two, one each side.
http://geography.about.com/od/climate/a/itcz.htm
Joel O’Bryan says:
“Please go educate yourself on thermodynamics of tropical cyclones as Carnot 2T heat engines before you embarrass yourself further.”
Quaint…Oh – I have +40 years meteorological experience & I have 23 years experience with the GOES wxsat Imager/Sounder operations.
“…The relevant temps of a TC are ~303 K sea surface waters and ~203 K at the tops of the clouds of a developed TC. ”
That is what I said…fine. Oh, BTW – that temperature difference is because of the atmospheric lapse rate. It is present through most of the tropics & mid-latitudes. It’s even greater over the deserts…nothing special.
“That delta 100 K drives a lot of heat release into space when that water is eventually condensed high in those cloud tops…”
And there you go. The TC removes heat from the ocean/air & the result is wind and rain. The IR signature to space is nearly irrelevant when compared to clear sky. The tall cloud tops provide 100K of insulation. Also, the condensation process does not begin at the cloud top, it starts at the cloud base (Lifted Condensation Level) and ends at the cloud top (Equilibrium Level) as the parcel is rising…and cooling (loosing heat, BTW).
Sorry, the rest of your post is quite irrelevant to the conversation of latent heat, LWIR, space & such.
Let’s list a few facts concerning this issue;
1) A dry air parcel being lifted through the atmosphere COOLS at 5.5°F/1,000 ft till it reaches it’s Dewpoint temp which is dependent on the amount of water vapor (gas) in that parcel. The dryer it is, the cooler (higher) it has to go till it reaches it’s condensation point (LCL).
2) Once the LCL is reached, the air parcel being lifted through the atmosphere COOLS at 3°F/1,000 ft. This is where the latent heat process is a factor. It adds ~2.5F/1000 ft. to the cooling process…but the process is still COOLING.
Through this whole parcel lifting process, the sensible heat that was the starting temp is exchanged for the parcel expansion & the converse is that, when the parcel descends (and it will to maintain the vertical pressure balance), the parcel will WARM. Also, if that parcel still has any liquid/solid water in it, as it descends & warms, the water will start to evaporate & the latent that process will work in reverse & cause ~2.5F/1000 ft. COOLING to the parcel (evaporative/dynamic cooling) till all the water has been transformed to water vapor (gas) the the dry lapse rate of 5.5°F/1,000 ft will be maintained as it descends (and warms) till the parcel reaches the surface or another warmer layer of air and it will stop.
3) Back to the top of the cloud, once the Equilibrium Level is reached (usually the Tropopause), the parcel is at the same temp as it’s surrounding environment and the lifting (cooling) STOPS. This, of course, includes the latent heating process.
4)Clouds, by their very nature being water/ice, BLOCK LWIR energy from passing through. The only IR energy you can detect with a cloud is it’s skin temp (the very surface). This does not matter if you are looking at the cloud base, the cloud side or the cloud top. THIS IS VERY IMPORANT!! If an airplane were flying in clear sky & trailing behind it on a long tether was a giant block of material glowing & maintained at 5000F, you could see that temp on an IR detector. HOWEVER, when that plane flies into a cloud…you can no longer see the LWIR signature of that extremely hot material because the cloud is blocking it.
5)A satellite in space (my job, BTW) looking down to Earth with it’s LWIR detectors, see the warm surface through clear skies (note: this is ignoring the Water Vapor Channel which is looking at a narrow specific IR freq which is sensitive to water vapor IR absorption). Now, if there is a cloud over that warmer surface, the IR sensor (and the cooling of space), sees the temp of the cloud top and the IR/heat signature of the surface is blocked. This occurs even with very thin cirrus clouds which the Sun may shine through with relative ease. The lower the cloud top (stratus/fog), the warmer the IR temp & the taller the cloud top (cumulus,cirrus), the COLDER the IR temp.
If you have stuck with me through all this, the take-away is;
1)Clouds do not ‘dump LWIR/heat’ to space in a way that is better than clear skies – they block LWIR/heat from the surface below from radiating to space.
2) The latent heat process is a small, temporary process whose only function is to help the parcel to continue to rise the help convert water vapor to solid/liquid water to fall as precip. or to cool the parcel as it descends while the liquid/ice evaporates. **NOTE** this evaporative cooling is *VERY* important in the winter when precip is falling through dry air that is close to freezing. It can cause a forecast to transition from rain to snow as the column cools from the evaporation.
Regards,
Jeff
Caleb said:
“Can you explain where the heat has gone, using your own vision of how things work? I actually confess to an inability to fully grasp why thundershowers are cooling and a Chinook is warming.”
hey Caleb, I hope my post just above helps to explain. If you need more details, feel free to ask…just be specific 😉
Jeff
JKrob says: Let’s list a few facts concerning this issue;
1) A dry air parcel being lifted through the atmosphere COOLS at 5.5°F/1,000 ft till it reaches it’s Dewpoint temp which is dependent on the amount of water vapor (gas) in that parcel.
Before I decide whether to read any more or what you post on this subject, could you define what you mean by “dry are” and remind me how much water vapour it contains?
thanks.
oops, “dry air”
JKrob says:
August 2, 2014 at 3:21 am
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So the net take home is?
Please bear in mind that the clouds stop solar from reaching the surface below; in particular they prevent the oceans from absorbing solar which would otherwise have warmed the ocean.
I’m guessing that’s many, many hiroshimas worth of energy lost to space; one of many examples of Trenberth’s “missing heat”.
Let’s see how the jet stream controls the hurricanes.
http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/250hPa/orthographic=-102.83,16.71,419
richard verney says:
“Please bear in mind that the clouds stop solar from reaching the surface below; in particular they prevent the oceans from absorbing solar which would otherwise have warmed the ocean.”
Well…sort of. The blockage of clouds to SW light is dependent on the density of the cloud. The thicker the cloud, the more blockage. A thin Cirrus or Stratus cloud will allow a large percentage of SW energy through (it is still ‘bright’ below the cloud) where a cumulonimbus cloud (thunderstorm to laymen) will block a large portion of the energy (it is ‘dark’ below the cloud). Think of it as a dimmer switch on a light bulb.
HOWEVER…in the LWIR, the mere existence of a cloud will block 100% of the surface energy from passing to space regardless of the clouds density. It is an on-off switch to a light bulb.
Jeff
Greg says:
“…could you define what you mean by “dry are” and remind me how much water vapour it contains?”
Hey, it was early (around 4:30 am) 😉
Jeff
Greg,
Sorry missed the jist of your post. As for “dry air”, maybe the more accurate term is unsaturated air. The amount of water vapor in unsaturated air is irrelevant to the adiabatic process. If the air is unsaturated, it behaves in the dry adiabatic mode ’till’ it reaches saturation, then it behaves in the moist adiabatic mode.
Jeff
JK at 3:21
“Ignoring the Water Vapor Channel”
Isn’t that the Elephant in the room ?
Note that, in the article, only the two cyclones nearest to Mexico have a chance of further development. Atmospheric conditions are not favorable for development the other three.
“JKrib As for “dry air”, maybe the more accurate term is unsaturated air.”
OK, that would make more sense. Not quite the same thing.
I was wondering whether meteorologists had a different definition of the term, like air with no rain in it !
Jeff Krob
I can confirm via measurements that clouds block 99% of the surface IR. The difference in the atmospheric radiation from the thermal surface radiation is typically about a degree or so with an overcast sky. Ocean surface radiation is NOT the primary way the ocean loses energy.
Evaporation (latent heat) is the primary vector for ocean surface cooling and that atmospheric radiation does not warm the thermal ocean surface.
@Jeff: thunderstorms cool SST significantly and permanently.
Where does this head energy end up?
JKrob says:
August 2, 2014 at 3:26 am
I assume Caleb is talking about ground level observations.
Thunderstorms take moist air and as it expands going up, its temperature goes down due to adiabatic expansion. The rain that forms is cold, and as it falls, it doesn’t go through adiabatic compression. It does chill the air it falls through, so the result is cold rain, but not as cold as where it formed. If it chills the air enough, convection gets reversed and you can have a downburst of cold air.
I’m not intimately familiar with Chinooks and their relatives, but if you have a stream of air flowing over a mountain ridge, it may wring out some water vapor as rain, which releases latent heat to the air. If the air above is warm enough, then as the air flow warms on the downside, convection won’t set in and you wind up with a strong, warm, dry wind at the base of the ridge.
The way a hurricane cools the ocean surface is through increased evaporation due to high winds. The lighter, saturated air then becomes the fuel for continued or increased winds.
The latent energy primarily goes into expanding the Earths atmosphere, Work in other words. The Hurricane itself is thus cooler and enlarged compared to the surrounding area but it contains more energy. That energy will eventually get dispersed and radiated away.
True, however, the cloud tops reflect light from the sun during the day. The higher the cloud tops, the more sun light reflected due to less IR absorption in the troposphere.