People send me stuff. This “never let a good crisis go to waste” dreck was sent to me today from a Madison Avenue PR outfit called “Climate Nexus” who doesn’t seem to know much about climate, or weather, or California. But, they can spin a good yarn. The storm impacting California today is just like hundreds of previous storms in recorded weather history, the only thing that is new is the desire to link it to climate change for political purposes. In my opinion, it’s bullshit of the highest order.
![sat_pacific_640x480[1]](https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/sat_pacific_640x4801.jpg?quality=83)
FYI FOR JOURNALISTS
Northern California Super Storm Linked to Changing Climate
To: Journalists
From: Climate Nexus
Date: December 11, 2014
Re: The Climate Context of California’s Atmospheric River Storm
With the drought-causing high-pressure zone dubbed the “Ridiculously Resilient Ridge” pushed aside for now, a powerful storm associated with what are called “atmospheric rivers” is currently drenching the California Bay Area. Atmospheric rivers are relatively narrow, long streams of clouds and atmospheric water vapor that are associated with major storms in the Pacific. These streams, many of which originate from Hawaii or beyond and are known as the “Pineapple Express,” bring moisture from the Tropics into the West Coast. “It’s essentially a fire hose of water brought up from the tropics that comes up and crashes into the West Coast,” said Michael Dettinger, an atmospheric scientist with the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla.
Atmospheric river storms are responsible for 30-50 percent of all the precipitation in California and are also responsible for over 80 percent of major flooding events. Climate research indicates that the impacts of these storms are expected to escalate dramatically if carbon emissions continue along the business-as-usual path, and that atmospheric rivers may already be impacted by current warming:
- As the world heats up and more heat is carried in the atmosphere as water vapor, heavy precipitation events are becoming more intense.
- Climate models project that atmospheric river storms in California will become more frequent and intense in the future, which means it is likely that the current storm is a taste of what’s to come.
- Surface temperatures off the coast of California during this particular storm are much warmer than usual, helping to pump even more moisture into the storm.
A Severe Storm
The current storm is expected to be one of the most severe in five years, with high wind speeds up to 65 mph and 2 to 6 inches of rain expected through Friday for San Francisco, Sacramento, and other northern cities. Conditions are so severe that the San Francisco Unified School District announced on Wednesday, December 10 that it would close schools on Thursday, when the heaviest impacts will likely be felt. At least four local rivers in Northern California are forecast to peak above flood stage late Thursday or early Friday, adding up to 32 feet of water to their nearly dry banks, according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration charts. With this amount of rain at the tail end of California’s driest year on record (and in at least the last 1,200 years), which led to a devastating wildfire season, NOAA has also advised locals to watch out for periods of heavy rain over recent burn scars that could cause debris flows and flash flooding.
A Charged Atmosphere
In the past half-century, climate change has charged the atmosphere with more water vapor, fueling extreme precipitation and loading storms of all types with additional moisture that ends up as rain and snowfall. The fingerprint of global warming has been firmly documented in the shift toward extreme precipitation already observed in the northern hemisphere. In the particular case of atmospheric river storms in California other factors, especially wind strength, can also influence how much rain is wrung out of the storm. We are still learning how climate change may be affecting those factors.
The atmospheric rivers that arrive in California collect moisture over a large swathe of the tropics, including the extra water vapor added to the atmosphere by global warming. This water is then delivered to California through the end of the storm hose, creating torrential rain and floods.
Since 1950, atmospheric river storms have been responsible for 81 percent of the most well-documented levee breaks in California’s Central Valley and 80 percent of the flooding in California rivers. In delta areas, such as the San Francisco Bay, climate change puts the region in double jeopardy. Climate change contributes to sea level rise, which adds to the flood levels pushed up by the atmospheric river storms. Since 1854 sea levels have rise about a foot in the San Francisco Bay.
A Warmer Ocean
Temperatures off the California coast are currently 5 to 6°F warmer than historic averages for this time of year—among the warmest autumn conditions of any time in the past 30 years—which could intensity the current atmospheric river storm. While connections between global warming and the current, unusually warm waters off the California coast are not fully understood, the warm coastal conditions are known to be linked to rare changes in wind patterns. Winds that normally blow from the north, trapping warm water closer to the equator, have slackened since the summer, allowing the warm water to move north.
And a More Intense Future
Looking ahead, the computer models predict that climate change will cause the very worst atmospheric river storms hitting California to become much more frequent and larger. One model illustrating the impacts of a large-scale atmospheric storm, similar in scope to the infamous river storm of 1861 that turned the Central Valley into an inland lake, found that such an event would inflict over $400 billion in damages in modern day California.
For more information or to be connected with experts on the link between climate change and atmospheric rivers in California contact Paige Knappenberger at pknappenberger@climatenexus.org.
Climate Nexus is a strategic communications group dedicating to highlighting the wide-ranging impacts of climate change and clean energy solutions in the U.S.
Contact information: Climate Nexus, Climate Nexus, 171 Madison Ave Suite 901, New York, NY 10016
Atmospheric river storms are responsible for 30-50 percent of all the precipitation in California
Climate models project that atmospheric river storms in California will become more frequent and intense in the future
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so it looks like global warming will reduce the droughts in California. And the problem with this is???
fredberple,
No problem at all. I’d take that trade in a heartbeat. But the release didn’t say anything about drought reduction.
Dang windy up here on Tahoe ridge (Kingsbury). Not much snow yet–mostly a wind event.
Good Morning America, ABC’s morning show, lead with the breathless announcement that the “Pineapple
Express” is the worst storm in half a decade!!!
I wonder what percentage of voters know what a decade is, let alone half of one ?
I wonder . . .
Why do they use the term “worst”?
Why would they not write “best”?
It is interesting how word choice gives the game away.
The current storm is expected to be one of the most severe in five years
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hardly much of a change if a more severe storm happened only 5 years ago. more like climate no change than climate change.
2 to 6 inches of rain
============
On No California it is Armageddon! Rain California Rain. Woe is California.
Of course if California had actually spent the money to catch the rain instead of chasing their tails over CO2, it would be a non-issue and the drought in California would be over. Instead we have a bunch of Weepy Bills that can’t figure out that water doesn’t actually come from a tap.
I’m waiting for someone from California to propose we run a hose from the tap to the reservoir to fill it.
{A second posting of this request in case it was ALSO sent to an invisible spam bin as a consequence of its being a Reply to the original “in moderation” post}
Dear Moderator,
Just in case my comment in this thread today at 4:47pm does not go to you but ends up in some “invisible” SPAM BIN, please look for my comment (it had a lot of links and that is likely why the “moderation” hold).
Thank you!
Janice
Who is funding this propaganda outfit??
Now I know why you never respond to my comments… .
#(:))
Thank you for your posts Janice, the one at 4:17 was helpful And I read all your and jim steele’s posts.
Your friend
michael
Hi, Michael!
Thanks! (and for saying so!)
Your WUWT pal,
Janice
P.S. I did not have pax propter vim memorized… I, too, looked it up! 🙂
http://news.yahoo.com/japan-burns-more-coal-climate-policies-under-pressure-021305951.html
Just for fun see what happens when a country has to change its goals for the good of its people.
michael
@Janice you should know I always love reading your posts, even if I do not reply.
@Mike Thanks for your comment it made my day. And to be grouped with Janice was a double honor.
@ur momisugly Mike the Morlock
Great find in that article on Japan and coal-powered electricity generation. GOOD FOR YOU, JAPAN (and even though you cannot say this out loud, just silently tell China to stick it in their ear about coal targets and keep on smiling and bowing and smiling and bowing and using COAL and fire up those nuclear power plants again, too!).
@ur momisugly Jim Steele — thanks and …. THANKS! #(:))
Thank you, BTW This article by Anthony Watts is on Yahoo I typed winter storms California dec 11 2014 and found it there its on the second page.
Good for you Anthony!
now its time to sleep, per chance to dream,,,
michael
Janice
I believe the Japs are about to reopen their Nuclear stations as well. The ones that still work, of course.
@ur momisugly Mike! Hamlet Morlock — aaaaaa — don’t do it! That is a “long term solution to a short-term problem.” Remember, “what dreams may come” {“Hamlet,” Act III, Sc. 1} may not be what you would wish for… . 😉
Seriously, hope you slept well. Glad you are continuing to post on WUWT.
*********************************
@ur momisugly Stephen Richards (I wonder if we are related, btw, my maternal great-grandmother’s maiden name was “Richards” …. her grandfather, Evan Richards, emigrated in the early 1800’s from Cardiff, Wales ….. I also wonder about that lemon tree I ask you about and ask you about #(:)) …) — thanks for that good news! Vive les Japonais! (since all the “Japs” are likely dead or nearly dead, now…. grrr they were horrible, what they did to China… at Pearl Harbor…. in the Philippines… etc…. they earned that label…. and my grandparents never stopped using it and I understood why).
GO, NUCLEAR POWER!
ClimateNexus are clueless, climate day-trading, fear mongering propagandists. On November 7th they wrote about how climate change was threatening with a longer more devastating drought
“One of the hallmarks of climate change is that, on average, wet regions are getting wetter and dry regions are getting drier (IPCC AR5 WGI SPM, p.3). The Southwestern U.S. is a naturally dry region, and experts predict that it will get drier as climate change continues.
There is strong physical evidence to show that in medieval times droughts in California lasted for decades, and some experts fear that the severity of the current drought could portend a similarly long stretch of very dry conditions. This has further implications for California’s drought in that it will limit the ability of Californian cities to compensate by drawing water from other areas. …blah, blah, blah”
http://climatenexus.org/learn/drought/drought-california
Nice post, Jim Steele (I read you). 🙂
According to their projections, it looks like California will become a more intense wet desert.
So now we are told to believe that “CO2 driven global warming”, which by-the-way has been absent for 18+ years, will cause permanent draught as well as “atmospheric river-driven floods and extreme rainfall”.
Next, we’ll be told that teenage sexuality causes both increased solar radiation and darker nights
Everything in California is wierder
I should know – – as a Native Son of the Golden West
Must be like living in Tasmania.
Haven’t the warmists been bitching about drought for the past 5 years? This is how they normally end, with a drenching.
uh huh,
I remember recent media hype about this being the “one in 3,000yr droughts” or some such bulldust very recently
anyone got media links for that?
be nice to air them now..just a friendly reminder etc :-
You’re right, Anthony, it is a real eye roller. I am 47 and born in Chico, CA. and have grown up with storms like this. Perfectly natural. This is normal except the flooding is no big deal this time. I took a ride up W. Sacramento today and the flooding was minimal.
We had a lot of these in the 1950’s that hit my home, Point Arena, on the coast 150 miles north of San Francisco. We could tell when one was coming: the wind would shift and come from the south, and it would get warmer. The prevailing north wind rain storms were smaller, and colder. There seems to be nothing new under the Sun, except the ignorance of those who think climate change began with the birth of Al Gore and the “science” of Michael E. Mann.
Spent some time before/after dinner following the money here.
Pretty easy. The sole funding is the ‘Rockefeller Philanthropy Advison’ ( a 501(c)3) of the sort recently harassed by Lois Lerner of the IRS– except not this one, since not of a comservative persuation. Not possible to track down which Rockefeller heirs back it without IRS help of the sort Lois used… (strangely not now forthcoming.)
Now the .org itself is quite forthcoming. Mission: “We believe the human contribution of climate change is too great to ignore.” So they do MSM PR about it. They are a legally chartered tax exempt CAGW megaphone.
Staffers: JN, former director of NDF legislative and public affairs. No science credentials.
BT, career Hill staffer ‘formerly involved in Katrina…’ but probably not an on the ground rescuer…
Folks just Google them. Is all there. Green staffer newbies, possibly adept at Hill (political) PR. A pure political tax exempt propaganda machine staffed by Green ( behind the ears) former Hill junior staffers, funded by now 4th generation Rockefellers…who made their money by monopolizing oil.
Some of the stuff WUWT is sent should be returned to sender…unopened.
But thanks for the opportunity to expose this naked political PR.
Good thing these dimbulbs weren’t around for the 1964-65 floods. They would have had a field day blaming that one on AGW. And if this storm had been a rain on snow event, think of the story they could have made up.
“A Charged Atmosphere
………….The fingerprint of global warming has been firmly documented ……………”
When you click on “firmly documented” it goes to another conjecture piece with the same what may be or could be.
It will be interesting to see if the current storm’s precipitation totals hit the accumulations that occurred in the 96/97 “Heavy Precipitation Event”
http://www.cnrfc.noaa.gov/storm_summaries/jan1997storms.php
http://www.cnrfc.noaa.gov/storm_summaries/google.php?storm=jan1997
Do we have a global precipitation graph similar to this global drought graph – I can’t find one – there must be one somewhere:?:
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/sdata20141-f51.jpg
Sure, just do a Mann-Tijander and flip this one upside down and change the color scheme to green and blue… easy peasy. (I’m not a real climate scientist, I just play one on TV but excellent science like this should be good for at least a 2 or 3 year funding grant.)
Our planet had dangerously low CO2 levels before the Industrial Revolution at just 280 ppm. Humans came along and rescued it by boosting CO2 levels to 400 ppm, still deficient and much lower than ideal but enough for the biosphere to start booming again, vegetative health to improve, plant growth to speed up and many creatures having more food…….including humans with record crop yields by a wide margin.
A different story has been spun and CO2, the life blood of plants and creatures on this planet has been labeled as pollution because of a theory regarding temperatures which have risen slightly and added to the benefits.
Funny thing about much of the extreme weather that these people claim that the theory and models project. It contradicts the physical laws or meteorology 101. When you increase temperatures in the higher latitudes and decrease the meridional temperature contrast, it provides LESS energy for mid latitude cyclones. One would expect less severe weather and lower numbers of violent tornadoes and weaker jet streams.
When you have warmer night time lows vs not much change in highs, it DECREASES the diurnal fluctuations in temperature. When you have milder Winters at the highest latitudes, it DECREASES the amount of the most extreme cold.
Somehow, things have been so twisted around that one side, in the midst of almost every measure of planetary health on this planet that contradicts their position, can insist that their science is settled and anybody that disagrees is a denier.
We should be trying to increase carbon dioxide levels. Ask the planet and Mother Nature. She’s been screaming that message loud and clear for several decades. Satellite pictures and hundreds of studies have delivered this message on a silver platter to humans.
Extreme cognitive bias, self serving interests/agenda’s, massive ego’s, money and control/power are what matter most.
I’m embarrassed, as an atmospheric scientist for 32 years to see climate science having become so dishonest, corrupted and non scientific.
What is sad are the amount of people out there that will reference the article as gospel.
Probably the same amount who think half a decade is 50 years.
?…about 45% of regular folk, and 97% of climate scientists.
Heavy rain in the Oakland hills, but the high winds forecast never seemed to materialize.
We lost a 40-50′ live coast oak this morning and maybe another tree just now, heavy rains on the hillside making the soil too soggy for the roots.
Oregon & Washington have been getting wind, trees and power lines down. Rain too. Nothing new in any of this.
Oh, and Washaway Beach is — hmm, washing away.
http://www.komonews.com/news/local/WATCH-IT-GO-3rd-home-tips-into-ocean-at-Washaway-Beach-285567491.html
Fiction
Seems to me that the concept of anomalous weather and climate makes about as much sense as the concept of anomalous bingo calls and lottery numbers. I’m betting models can’t predict either scenario well enough to put my money on…
Note that the drought monitor map is curiously unchanging.
http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/
This map is updated on Thursday based on the conditions as of Tuesday, but we’ve had LOTS of rain before this last Tuesday. It’s been raining for weeks in CA and this map hasn’t changed a lick.
I suspect this map is made using manual labor and is often not as up to date as it could be. I’ve been watching this for some time and when the Texas drought ended, they were a few weeks slow to make the changes too.
This is getting more and more absurd…
Over 50% of California is semi-arid/desert which means it’s prone to periods of drought…
California gets a large portion of its precipitation during El Nino events, and has built reservoirs (though insufficient to meet growing water demands) to capture as much precipitation as possible when California gets its meager amount of rain.
During the 15-yr period from 1983~1998, there were 6 El Nino events and California received more rain than normal. Over the subsequent 15-year period from 1999~2014, there have only been 2 “official” El Nino events, plus the quasi-El Nino event we’re experiencing now.
A 30-yr PDO cool cycle started in 2005, which means there will likely be fewer and weaker El Nino events compared to the last 30-yr warm PDO cycle (1977~2005). This sinusoidal pattern of PDO/El Nino correlation can be clearly seen here:
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/enso/mei/ts.gif
Rather than cursing the much needed California rain storms, and erroneously blaming CO2 for them, people should be grateful the quasi-El Nino is helping to generate some precipitation in parched California, because there is an excellent chance California will not be getting much rain over the next 20 years while the PDO is in a 30-yr cool phase.
What means “multivariate” when it comes to enso index. I sorta understand “multivariable”; but nothing clangs when I think of “multivariate”
Sounds like a word from Mrs. Malaprop, if you ask me.
Excellent post. Let me add that California is full of dry river beds and dry lakes that from time to time have been full of water and sometimes are just bone dry and it has nothing to do with CO2. It is a matter of normal weather cycles. There are huge alluvial fans that were to a large extent caused by water flow but most of the time exist in a semi arid landscape. Much of the wild plant life in at least the southern part of the state has evolved in semi arid to desert conditions yet there is evidence of occasional huge floods. Nothing has really changed.
Sure, CO2 has LWIR absorption bands as does H2O. But a good absorber is also a good radiator so as CO2 absorbs LWIR absorption band radiation it also radiates it as well. CO2 does not traradiantnt heat, rather idiffuseses it. CO2 has no real effect on how mucradiantnt energy gets radiated out to space and that is why there is no real evidence that CO2 has any effect on climate.
In 1991, I recorded 10 inches of rain over 3 days at my house near Lake Elsinore California during an even more severe Pineapple Express event.