From the “with models, we can make anything believable” department.
New paper argues for a stronger influence of Arctic sea-ice loss on recent Eurasian cooling, thus causing colder winters and more snow in Europe due to climate change.
A reconciled estimate of the influence of Arctic sea-ice loss on recent Eurasian cooling
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-018-0379-3 (paywalled)
Abstract
Northern midlatitudes, over central Eurasia in particular, have experienced frequent severe winters in recent decades1,2,3. A remote influence of Arctic sea-ice loss has been suggested4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14; however, the importance of this connection remains controversial because of discrepancies among modelling and between modelling and observational studies15,16,17.
Here, using a hybrid analysis of observations and multi-model large ensembles from seven atmospheric general circulation models, we examine the cause of these differences. While all models capture the observed structure of the forced surface temperature response to sea-ice loss in the Barents–Kara Seas—including Eurasian cooling—we show that its magnitude is systematically underestimated. Owing to the varying degrees of this underestimation of sea-ice-forced signal, the signal-to-noise ratio differs markedly.
Correcting this underestimation reconciles the discrepancy between models and observations, leading to the conclusion that ~44% of the central Eurasian cooling trend for 1995–2014 is attributable to sea-ice loss in the Barents–Kara Seas.
Our results strongly suggest that anthropogenic forcing has significantly amplified the probability of severe winter occurrence in central Eurasia via enhanced melting of the Barents–Kara sea ice. The difference in underestimation of signal-to-noise ratio between models therefore calls for careful experimental design and interpretation for regional climate change attribution.
Data availability
The monthly SST and SIC in HadISST33 are available from the Met Office website (www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadisst/). The ERA-Interim reanalysis data sets44 are available from the ECMWF website (http://apps.ecmwf.int/datasets/). The six additional AGCM outputs analysed are freely available from the NOAA FACTS website (https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/repository/alias/facts/). The MIROC4 AGCM output generated and analysed in this study is available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
Comments by climate scientist Reto Knutti on Twitter:
The tricky question is whether that is just due to a random series of unusual years or partly due to Arctic warming. In our simulations we found no link.https://t.co/2NXkdICrh6
The new paper argues the real link is stronger than in models.— Reto Knutti (@Knutti_ETH) January 15, 2019
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That’s why it’s not science. Anything that happens (cold or warmth) can be made consistent with the theory.
I do urge all these climate scientists to stay away from casinos, lest they discover that streaks of red or black are much more common than human intuition believes they are.
Reto Knutti on ETH Zurich climate vice –
Maybe they have a theme song. For the trailer.
Don’t forget, human CO2 alone causes climate change global warming and all that extra snow, so it is still all our fault – apparently….
Haha
We should be calling this sciensplaining.
Or “Warmspreading”
I don’t subscribe to Nature. Have they retracted the studies that predicted shorter and warmer winters in Europe. I guess kids will know what snow is in the future!
Negative AO/NAO episodes drive cold shots to the continents, and they drive sea ice loss through Arctic humidity events, Arctic cyclones, and warm AMO pulses.
Negative AO/NAO has nothing to do with AGW, but everything to do with low solar.
IOW, It IS the Sun, stupid!
Question:
Say you have a bowl of room temperature water and two ice cubes get dropped into it. The ice melts slowly and the water cools down.
Then you start over with the same bowl and water, then chop up two identical ice cubes into 16 pieces, then put them in the bowl. The extra surface area allows for the water to be cooled down quicker, although the ice melted proportionally faster.
End result is the same in final temp of water after all ice melts.
So if the polar ice cap is breaking up on the edges, is it cooling down the surrounding ocean water faster than before, even though the demise of this same ice would be quicker ?
In your analogy the colder water from the ice soon heats to room temperature. However your analogy is backwards from the real world. In the real world the oceans have 1000 times the heat capacity of the atmosphere. There hasn’t been any extra melting in the Arctic in the summer time. The higher temperatures have only occurred in the late winter early spring when temps were still too cold for melting. There is more ice in the Arctic now than at any time in last 4 years. Looking at the Polar Portal map of the Danish Meteorological institute, it shows proof of previous statement plus it shows same thing with sea ice extent. Also since sea ice extent presently covers the complete Kara sea, that can’t possibly have anything to do with any melting. So that leaves the Barents sea north of Norway and Sweden..etc Well since all ice grows until it peaks in March no amount of melting is going on anywhere in the Arctic at the present time. If there was more melting in Barents sea which is much larger than the Kara sea , that melting would have had to occur 6 months ago. The Danish polar portal never showed any abnormal increase of Arctic temperatures last summer. Sea ice extent ebbs and flows. there is always cold ice snow melting every year and the waters of the Barents sea would understandably be colder for a short period of time after the summer melt. However by the time winter set in, in November that cold water would have circulated in the world’s oceans. The amount of the annual melt in Barents sea is so small in comparison to total water volume of Barents sea. Even Wikipedia acknowledge that the Barents sea is the arctic hot spot. So this is not news. However the reason for that is that “The main climate-forming factors are…….. the influence of the warm Atlantic water masses, entering the Barents Sea in the west. ”
To claim that any extra melting of the Barents sea waters 4 months earlier (given the regular warm waters from the Atlantic ) has anything to do with more snow in Eurasia is to stretch a correlation to a causality to the same extent of 1000’s of order of magnitude of trying to stretch a rubber band that would span the globe.
http://www.barentsinfo.org/Contents/Nature/Barents-Sea/Physical-characteristics
Loss of Arctic sea ice will cause a loss of heat from the Arctic Ocean, so I am not surprised there would be descending high pressure cold fronts on to those areas during the winter. Combine that feature with precipitation events, and more snow ensues.
Nothing to do with CAGW though.
Could be to do with toxic warm-spreading
A time frame difference of 6 months later after oceans have had time to circulate the little amount of extra melt water that may have occurred (Danish site info showed no abnormal melting in Barents sea last summer) compared to total amount of ocean in the Barents sea; tells me that precipitation events 1000’s of miles way and 6 months later has absolutely nothing to do with any recent Eurasian storms.
Is there any other discipline where journals can publish articles that forecast forcing X will result in Y (warming), and then a few years later publish articles forecasting that the same forcing will result in the opposite (cooling) without retracting the previous studies.
I mourn the degeneration of the institution which used to be one of the best scientific/engineering schools in the world. Part of the future could be seen in the Atmospheric Physics department in the 1970s when the dept head demonstrated that if you didn’t take his word for gospel you were in deep trouble in the department. Anyone wanting to finish a Doctorate had to kiss the “ring”.
From that point on, anything that got the department more funding was gospel.
But, but, but….. 97% of all scientists believe CAGW is real and even worse than originally predicted, and is no longer even up for further debate or scrutiny…. Not so much…
We’re in an El Niño cycle which usually generates milder winters and less snow, which isn’t happening.
Niño 3.4 SSTs will likely fall below 0.5C next week, marking the beginning of the end of the current El Niño cycle. The current El Niño cycle peaked in October 2018, so given the 4~5 month lag between El Niño temp spikes and lower troposphere temp spikes, UAH 6.0 temp anomalies should start to increase over the next 5 months. If they don’t, it’ll likely mean some other cooling mechanisms are offsetting normal El Niño warming, like: “The Blob” ending, the early stages of 30-year PDO/AMO/NAO ocean cool cycles, and the early stages of a 50-year Grand Solar Minimum event.
Although still very early in the year, Arctic temps are some of the lowest in 10 years, and if this continues, this year’s Arctic Sea Ice Minimum could be one of the highest in 10 years. Oops…
The next 2020/21 La Niña cycle will likely be a strong one (Niño 3.4 SST hitting -1.5C), and if this occurs, UAH 6.0 could fall to -0.3C by 2021, which may even cause a 25-year hiatus to reappear from mid-1996.
It’s also reasonable to expect Arctic Sea Ice Extents to continue increasing once the PDO/AMO/NAO are all in their 30-year cool cycles, the absence of The Blob, and the effects of 50-year Grand Solar Minimum all start a global cooling cycle as they have in the past.
I’m sure there will be many more “hybrid” climate models suggesting Global Warming causes Global Cooling and increases in Arctic Sea Ice, but at some point, even the most ardent CAGW acolyte will have to conclude CAGW is a bust…
The next 3~4 years should become really interesting.
We’re due for strong La Niña
They will blame next ice age on global warming , remember you heard it here first
Well, to be more precise they’ll blame it on “climate change,” the Gumby-like pseudo-theory that can be twisted into a pretzel to explain anything, even diametrically opposed things.
I think it snowed quite a bit back during World War II in Europe, and then there was the Little Ice Age before that and then the Big Ice Age before that. I think it has snowed quite a bit in Europe for a long time. It’s not a recent phenomenon.
Yes. During the last 30-year PDO/AMO/Nao cool cycles (1945~1976), global winters were often brutal and global temperatures fell. The 30-year ocean cool cycles before that (1980~1910) were also brutal and we experienced 30-years of global cooling…
It’s logical to assume that once these 30-year ocean cool cycle return from around 2021, global winters and global cooling will likely occur again.
We’ll see soon enough.
Arctic Ice extent January 15, 2009 to 2019. 13.4 km2, +-0.4 km2*. Essentially identical. This “variation” is thought to be (second only to C02 increasing by 10 ppm, more or less, in the same time frame) controlling the European climate? Label this Realist a Skeptic or even a Denier if you must but I’m not buying it.
*https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/
Were there big snows in 1935 when Arctic ice was where we are now?
I expect there were heavy snows in 1935 when Arctic ice was like now. Not?
I live in Europe. Our winters have become warmer in my lifetime. If the claim were true, the Glaciers would be growing, they have not. The idea of bringing the complexity of the climate to a simple set of equations is pretty useless, as has been proven numerous times, so why bother?
Barents-Kara sea ice particularly low and a cold blast of arctic air causing 1 in 100 year snowfall in Austria etc. Clearly this paper is bang on the nail!
What data do you have that the lower sea ice extent is due to temperature and not wind? IMO sea ice extent is a worthless metric of warming/cooling because wind can affect it as much as temperature can.
How come Global Warming Fanatics were predicting our children would never see snow?
Children of people who live in lowland England that is.
But dont let that stop you from interpreting Viner’s comment as for current ‘children’ and for the whole Earth.
That would let a good strawman go to waste.
So when are we supposed to believe them.
Should I believe that global warming means kids well never see snow again.
Or should I believe it means kids will be buried in the stuff.
Truth is I can no longer believe anything any “scientist” ever says, unless I can prove it myself.
Switzerland, Bavaria and Austria must be ready for heavy snow.
So hot is the new cold ? Good thing they told us. Now we will de-ice and anti-ice in summer.
*palmface*
Surely one can challenge this by demanding proof that CO2 causes the observed effects?
So what would global cooling do, how many places would get warmer .. less wet less snow and far less severe storms ?.