Reposted from Awesome Weather Facts
By Chris Martz | July 26, 2019
Follow @ChrisMartzWX
It’s summer, temperatures are hot － sometimes record hot － and as usual, climate alarmism reaches record highs, and climate activists have a field day with it by fear mongering rather than reasoning with facts and data. Every week, various weather events end up getting caught in the spokes of the wheel of climate; it’s an endless cycle. Rinse, wash, repeat. This time, it’s the [second] European heatwave.
A Bit of Historical Perspective
While countries like the Netherlands, Germany, and Belgium have recorded their hottest temperatures on record this week, Paris’s record high of 108.7°F (42.6°C) on Thursday, July 25 made international headlines and consequently sparked climate insanity.¹
The graph below (Figure 1) shows the maximum temperature in Paris, France for each year since 1900.² As indicated by the red trendline, there has been a noticeable increase in the annual maximum temperature in Paris over the long run, however, the trend is not alarming.
Paris’s previous hottest temperature record stood for nearly 72 years.³ On July 28, 1947, the city reached 104.7°F (40.4°C).³ Paris’s high of 108.7°F (42.6°C) on Thursday broke the old record by 4°F (2.2°C), which is an incredible feat by any stretch of the imagination. To break an all-time temperature record by 4°F in summer, let alone tie it, is extremely difficult to do, even with global warming.
Figure 1. Paris, France annual maximum temperature since 1900.
The 1947 heatwave was an incredible one in Europe and it’s forever stitched in the memories of elders.
In Paris, the heatwave lasted for 12 days (July 22 through August 2) with highs consistently at or above 90°F (32.2°C).³ Two days were at or above 100°F (37.8°C), and four were at or above 95°F (35°C).³
What really stuck out to me when comparing maximum temperatures this summer with 1947 is that maximum temperatures seem to trace those of 1947 (Figure 2). It’s quite interesting and odd.
Figure 2. Paris, France daily maximum temperature for the summer of 1947 and 2019.
Is Climate Change to Blame?
Like most scientists, I agree that climate change － both natural fluctuations or man-made forcings like land use and urbanization － should cause weather patterns and the intensity and/or frequency of extreme weather or weather-related events to change.
It’s indeed possible that the warmer atmosphere today as compared to the 1980s may have made this heatwave slightly more intense. However, nobody knows for sure because heatwaves have always occurred; some are just worse than others. It’s summer.
While this heatwave is the latest poster child for the “ecological breakdown,” there is a natural explanation for this heatwave, as with all other weather events.
There’s been a persistent weather pattern that’s causing this bake fest. A large area of high pressure is stationed over Europe and an area of low pressure is situated off of the coast of Ireland.⁴ The wind flow around the pressure centers are drawing in air from the south, which is blowing hot, Saharan air into Europe (Figure 3).⁴ This natural process occurs with or without 415 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
Figure 3. European surface map. – Met Office.
The air over France at the time of Paris’s record high was relatively dry (Figure 4), and as all weather hobbyists or meteorologists should know, dry air heats up faster than saturated air. Had the dew points (and thus relative humidity) been higher Thursday afternoon, the record high may not have been set!
Figure 4. 2-meter relative humidity in France. – weathermodels.com.
It’s also worth pointing out that Paris, like any other large city, is a massive urban heat island (UHI).
When land is developed, urban infrastructure takes place of land that was once covered with vegetation like grass and particularly forests.⁵ Development limits the amount of plant transpiration (evaporation that cools plant leaves and air temperatures).⁵ Buildings like factories, skyscrapers, houses, and shops, not to mention automobiles and dark urban infrastructure like roads and black roofs absorb and retain more heat than grassy surfaces or forested areas.⁵
All of the heat generated by these objects and surfaces make its way into the atmosphere above the city adding supplemental heat that’s not natural.⁵
I’ve seen some Tweets from a few meteorologists and other people who claim that the UHI is only or mostly effective at night.
While there is some truth to that (as most of the warming seen in the U.S., for instance, is with overnight temperatures), NOAA has created maps from various U.S. cities of both high and low temperatures.⁶ The map below (Figure 5) is of Baltimore, Maryland’s 3:00 p.m. afternoon temperature on August 29, 2018.⁶ Notice how the city is noticeably warmer than its more rural surroundings, even in the afternoon! I know this from personal experience because I live in Northern Virginia, not too far from Baltimore and Washington, D.C.
Figure 5. Baltimore, MD UHI effect.
My Conclusion
While it’s incredible that Paris exceeded their record high on Thursday, it’s important that we look not only at trends, but also give a bit of perspective.
One can not make a preconceived notion on one daily temperature measurement.
You have to first look at whether or not a record temperature occurred in an urban area, then see what the upper air pattern is doing, and lastly look at trends and previous years with similar atmospheric conditions.
Skeptics who use cold and snow as evidence that global warming is a hoax are always reminded by climate activists that weather and climate are vastly different, and they’d be correct.
So, why then do activists blame a single record high temperature, let alone a summer heatwave on climate change? That I can not answer. It seems to me that it’s “do as I say, not as I do.”
The bottom line is this: heatwaves happen, it’s summer, and it’s hot.
REFERENCES
[1] Leister, Eric. “Paris breaks all-time high temperature as deadly heat wave grips Europe.” AccuWeather. July 25, 2019. Accessed July 26, 2019. https://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/scorching-heat-produces-all-time-record-highs-in-belgium-netherlands-as-western-europe-swelters-under-heat-wave/70008886.
[2] “Annual Maximum of Monthly Maximum of Daily Maximum Temperature.” KNMI Climate Explorer. Accessed July 26, 2019. http://climexp.knmi.nl/data/xgdcnFR000007150_max12_anom_max1_anom.dat.
[3] “Maximum Temperature PARIS/LE BOURGET.” KNMI Climate Explorer. Accessed July 26, 2019. http://climexp.knmi.nl/data/xgdcnFR000007150.dat.
[4] “Surface pressure charts.” Met Office. July 26, 2019. Accessed July 26, 2019. https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/maps-and-charts/surface-pressure.
[5] “Satellites Pinpoint Drivers of Urban Heat Islands in the Northeast.” NASA. Accessed July 26, 2019. https://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/heat-island-sprawl.html.
[6] Herring, David. “Citizen Scientists take to the streets to map the hottest places in ten U.S. cities.” NOAA Climate.gov. July 24, 2019. Accessed July 26, 2019. https://www.climate.gov/news-features/features/citizen-scientists-take-streets-map-hottest-places-ten-us-cities.
Posted by Chris Martz Weather at
4:28 PM
Where is the weather station for Paris?
I found this site: http://www.vigilance-meteo.fr/en/europe/france/weather-paris/details/N-2085971/
It said: Data provided by weather station Paris-Le Bourget. Weather.com does not tell you where the readings are from. It is another reason not to use that site.
Le Bourget Airport is famous as the landing site for Charles Lindbergh’s historic solo transatlantic crossing in 1927 in the Spirit of St. Louis.
Since 1980 it has been solely a general aviation airport. But, serving a city the size and importance of Paris, it is very busy. The data I could find easily suggested that it saw about 150 take-offs or landings per day. OTOH, The city itself is compact and dense. A reading that is not munged by UHI could only be obtained from a station in a rural area near by.
Le voici
Malheureusement je ne parle que l’Anglais. Bonne chance mon ami.
The temperature of 42.6°C being quoted is from Parc Montsouris, a large green area in SE Paris. Le Bourget was similar.
Other towns around reported similarly, Rouen, at 41.3, exceeded its record of 38.1°C. UHI didn’t arrive this year. These are big changes.
Montsouris is inside Paris beltway. Everywhere I have been in paris it was highly built up. The park is only 40 acres. I would believe that it not free of UHI. NYC Central park is much bigger and it is inside the UHI. Le Bourget, being a busy airport, is certainly not confirmation.
Rouen is a city of 100,000. It, like most French cities is very dense. Until Anthony surveys the weather stations of France. i am going to be suspicious of all of these numbers
Nick,
UHI never ‘arrives’, its basically there all the time. It is implicit in the city/town being there.
Parc Montsouris is in pretty much central Paris, surrounded by buildings. It is a significant green area I suppose but small in the context of the surrounding built up areas. It might be slightly cooler than the surrounding built up areas by hardly remote from the UHI effect. Paris is hardly some small town and is much more built up than say Melbourne which has about a 5˚C UHI according to Melbourne Uni research.
As a general observation, which has had the greater increase over the 20th century/industrial age, CO2 or concrete/bricks/bitumen? Answer:- The latter by orders of magnitude.
This whole CAGW drivel relies on ‘dumpster diving’ sourced data and relentless shouty, shouty advocacy.
A for effort, F for science.
“UHI never ‘arrives’, its basically there all the time.”
Well, exactly. So how does it explaining Paris recording a temperature 4°F higher than in previous years?
I don’t believe Melbourne has a 5°C UHI effect. Here are rhe averages for Melbourne, and here for Sheoaks, a thoroughly rural site about 80km WSW (and 200m higher). The average maximum temperatures are very similar, eg January 26.0°C for Melbourne, 26.1 for Sheoaks.
Are weather extremes possible nick? What a couple hundred years best of data? How many extremes do you think you might find in a weather data basket filled with 2000yrs of data, say? Nope. It’s man’s doing and we must repent!!
Hahahahahahaha!
Nick has fully drunk the climate kool-aid!
Of course, Nick can explain exactly how much CO₂ raised temperatures every day?
The CO₂ level today is nearly exactly the same as the day the high temperature was beaten by 4°C.
Is today’s temperature 4°C higher too?
Tomorrows?
If not, why not?
Is CO₂ only highly active during certain days?
And they closed the La Trobe station partly because of high rise buildings and no wind. No wind = UHI?
“No wind = UHI?”
The averages shown are from Latrobe St, which seemed quite windy to me. Here are the averages for Burnley, about 3 km from Latrobe St. It’s a horticultural station; closed in 1969, so the averages are from an earlier period. The maxima are generally higher, eg January 26.5°C.
Re Paris and 4˚F, what previous years? How many? Besides if there is a big hot blow coming up from the Sahara then I reckon Paris would be hotter just from that, the UHI being an absorption effect.
As for Melbourne the 5˚C figure comes from research carried out by Melbourne University some years back so have a go at them Nick. The city council did a study in 2014 which came up with 4˚C.
Who’s the ‘denier’ here Nick? Does UHI exist or not Nick, in your opinion that is?
“”As the city gets built up more and more, having an observation site that’s surrounded by buildings is not going to be that representative. The wind observation at La Trobe wasn’t very useful because the wind would swirl in different directions, funnel up and down streets,” Mr Newham said.”
https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/the-quirky-reason-melbourne-s-weather-isn-t-quite-right-20190226-p510c3.html
“The existing Melbourne observation site, located at the Royal Society of Victoria in Latrobe Street, has been operating since 1908. Wind recordings for this station progressively deteriorated over the years due to the obstructions caused by buildings constructed around the city, and were finally switched off in 2009. The new Olympic Park station allows for wind recordings to be taken from the same location as the rest of the weather measurements.”
http://www.bom.gov.au/weather-services/announcements/vic/melb-olympic-park2013.shtml
“The wind observation at La Trobe wasn’t very useful”
“Wind recordings for this station progressively deteriorated”
So the problem wasn’t heat island, or even lack of wind. It was that they couldn’t measure wind direction accurately.
Nick Stokes
The BBC weather forecasting service, I’m not sure if it’s still the UK met office, don’t agree with you. In anticyclonic conditions they say rural areas will several degrees wsrmer/colder and the Glen’s of Scotland /Welsh valleys/Yorkshire moors/Peak district/Lake District etc even more.
in the UK things come in 1 or 2s,2 or 3s, a few, and several amongst other semi vague qualities. Several is more than 2 or 3 so more than several is about half a dozen. About 6 to you.
You’ve got to believe the BBC who believe that global heating is out to get us.
The BOM have stated that the climatology at the venerable Regional Office site in LaTrobe St, closed a few years ago, is not the same as that at the replacement site at Olympic Park. I had asked them how they intend to stitch the 2 records together, but got no answer, just the comment on different climatologists.
The question remains whether UHI at these two sites is comparable. Answer, nobody knows -and more, nobody can deduce it from past data. The idealistic concept of ringing a city with unaffected sites then subtracting their data from the city data does not work for 2 main reasons, one that the surrounding sites are two noisy and incoherent (so that an average value to subtract varies too much from the chosen mix of sites) two, because you can never establish that these ring sites are themselves free of UHI.
The whole UHI understanding for Melbourne city is a mess. Past peak measurements of UHI of several deg C are not representative of long term effects. But then, even a comparatively tiny half a degree C of UHI is half of the official claim that Australia warmed 0.9 degrees C in the Century starting 1910.
The amount of serious study of UHI globally is pathetically small given its potential to completely re-write the Global Warming Bible. One of those 3 monkeys has hands over the eyes. Geoff S
What explains the worst heatwave in Europe in 1911 lasting two months and killing thousands. Or the worst heatwaves in the US in the 1930s or the world’s worst last mega-drought, Federation drought , from 1895-1903.
Nothing to match those today.
Stroker
The record in the chart included in the article is how many decades?
A little over a century.
Paris has existed for several thousand years.
When you blabber about “previous years”, do you simply
ignore 2,000 years because no data happen to be available?
I suppose we can just assume it never got very
hot in Paris in those many prior centuries NOT on the chart?
Were the instruments changed over time.
Was their location changed over time.
Did economic growth increase the UHI effect?
Was there a GLOBAL warming trend during those decades?
Shouldn’t we expect record highs, in many areas, now and then, DURING a global warming trend?
Of course there are going to be record highs because that’s the basic definition of a warming trend.
This planet has also had mild cooling trends.
Do you claim they will never happen again?
How do you know that?
A high daily temperature in Paris, that’s higher than any other daily high temperature measured in the past 100 years, during a global warming trend, measured with different instruments, perhaps measured in different locations, with a larger population in the past, is proof of NOTHING.
Quite irrelevant! The volatility of all-time RECORD Tmax in urban histories of limited duration is invariably higher than that of AVERAGE daily Tmax. The former is far more influenced by local factors, including the entire panoply of steadily-growing UHI effects, than the latter. A century-long record of, say, daily fuel consumption in any city would no doubt show a rising trend of yearly maxima.
“Quite irrelevant!”
It’s exactly relevant to the proposition as stated, that Melbourne has a UHI effect of 5°C. If nothing is visible in the average max, then how do you expect it to show up in peak max?
What DOES show up in the annual average Tmax is that Melbourne (19.9C), over the entire 160 years of observation, has been 1C warmer than Sheoaks (18.9C) has been over the last 28 years. But UHI effects, which are NOT temporally stationary, are best discerned not by average differences in temperature level, which are much influenced by local siting, but in long-term differences in trend or in average first-differences. The relatively short Sheoaks record does not provide any such long term-indication.
An article in The Local
https://www.thelocal.fr/20190725/heatwave-heat-sink-effect-raises-temperature-in-paris-by-up-to-10c
quotes Meteo-France’s view that the Paris UHI effect adds 10˚C to the air temperature.
Unusually large claim. Urban Heat Island are usually 5-6 degrees C (not 10 degrees C).
So what? On the last day of January this year Rockford, Illinois set an all time record low temperature of -31. It had never been colder than -30 there in RECORDED history. The old record was -27 over a week earlier in January, nearer the average coldest days of the year. Was that proof of cooling or just weather? Which is it? BTW, the state set a new all time record low temperature on the same date. Cooling or weather? The same places that saw all time record on the last day of January also saw record late snow three months later.
Jim,
The question is whether or not there are more record highs than lows. The world is warming
and as such you would expect more record highs than lows which is exactly what you see.
Ask yourself when was there a month where the global average temperature was a record low for that month and then compare that with the last time the record was set for a record high
average temperature.
UHI conveniently ONLY drives temperature records ONE way, UP. Chicago O’Hare WOULD have had an all time record low, too, but for immense sub(really urban)ization.
It’s actually global average warming, not global warming. For example, taking the NOAA GHCN-Monthly V4 data set for the contguous US, and averaging each calendar month’s TAVG, there is a negatve trend over the past 4-5 years, except for Feb.
Since 1900, using a 1981-2010 baseline, the contiguous US has only warmed about 0.5C. The 6% of Earth’s land surface that represents is not large, but it is significant. 2000 of the 8000 reporting stations in the US show cooling trends since 2014-2015, so how can we truly call it “global” warming?
Come on… you are not allowed to do that! You ought to do numerology only in favor of climastrology. Against it it’s not allowed, it’s in the doctrine.
The first law of climastrology says: You must use the law of very large numbers in climastrology favor only, not against it! p-hacking in favor of the cargo cult is allowed, falsification is not! Cherry picking in favor of it is not a logical fallacy, cherry picking against is a logical fallacy!
It’s unlikely the conditions (influences) for this station are the same today as they were in eg. 1947. We have no idea what temps might have been, at this location, prior to circa 1870s, as it didn’t exist until sometime after.
Are record high temps on a particular moment in a particular location really what 400 ppm of CO2, is all about? Isn’t there a much bigger picture? Isn’t this just the opposite end of the scale to, record low temps are proof of an imminent Ice age?
Best to all, Eamon.
I attended the F1 race in Rhiems in 1961 and it was extraordinarily hot. The heat wave was not as widespread but is certainly was unusual, I guess.
I am not so sure that this is an unique event. Clear air allows much more insolation to reach the ground. So does less CO2, FWIW.
Historically there were terrible heat waves and drought in Europe recorded over the centuries.
I am glad we live in a age of air conditioning. As Tony Heller points out, years ago people died in their thousands with events like this. Is that techno-cure? Maybe. Is it bad? No.
I love it that extreme heat and cold are both blamed on AG CO2. Sheer entertainment.
The Tour De-France was stopped yesterday, because of a heavy snow storm.
There was snow and hail but it was stopped due to a mud flow
When you have a significant time difference between records and the new record obliterates the old one, assuming measurement and external factors have been controlled for, the majority factor of the increase would be more likely a confluence of periodic effects than a simple increase in the baseline. Sorta like a “rogue wave” in the data.
@Nick Stokes You’ve been caught spreading misinformation before.
When UK had a high temperature at Heathrow – you claimed it was consistent with the surrounding area and pointed to some weather data site. It turned out they had taken the Heathrow temperature and spread it over the south of England, resulting in a 12 degC difference between Peterborough and a village 1 mile to the south of it.
So tell me again how this record high temperature was measured in a green area and is similar to surrounding towns. I say you’re a liar!
I don’t know, but these countries are like the size of a state or two. Think about that for a minute. This winter, at least one state set an all time record low temperature and places in those states shattered their all time low records. Huh. Oh, that was just weather! This is (hope and) change, but the all time record cold was just weather. Okay, got it! That makes sense. Yep. Okay.
France, Germany, UK, Belgium, The Netherlands…
“France, Germany, UK, Belgium, The Netherlands”
All of which will fit comfortably underneath a high-pressure system, so it would be logical to assume that all of them will warm up simultaneously as a result.
Let’s come back in about a week and talk about this heatwave. We’ll be talking in the past tense. Apparently CO2 is only good for a few days of warmth and then it goes inactive, I guess. Or maybe it is just exclusively part of high-pressure systems and when the high-pressure system moves out, so does the CO2…
The historical weather station is Paris-Montsouris which sits in Montsouris Park (and near the International City for Students). Up to the 1920’s (and even the 1950’s) it was a nearly rural place due to the presence of abandoned fortifications. It is now a busy place with the nearby Boulevard des marechaux and the urban higway called boulevard peripherique.
But the main difference in temperature measurement since 1947 comes from the replacement of min-max mercury thermometers read once a day by frequently sampled Pt100 thermometers. This replacement only can account for the +2°C observed record.
Quote: “But the main difference in temperature measurement since 1947 comes from the replacement of min-max mercury thermometers read once a day by frequently sampled Pt100 thermometers. This replacement only can account for the +2°C observed record.”
Could you explain, how you get +2°C (for the max-Temperature which is discussed here).
Even the average temperature was AFAIK in Euope calculated whith the “Mannheimer Hours” approch ((T7+T14+”(T21)) /4 does not bring up the diference you mentioned (in average).
You might look at all the other weather stations across N France and W Europe… those not actually showing a new record will have been pretty close to it.
these temps are 10 degrees C higher than a warm summer, across a vast area.
(today in the UK it is a more normal 14C – 24 degrees C colder than last Thursday)
The Baltimore map is a good illustration of the Urban Heat Island effect, and it’s magnitude in one case.
Melbourne University did a UHI study for that city some years back and came up with a figure of about 5˚C (9˚F) and WEstern Sydney is typically 10˚C warmer than the coast. Take those figures off the “HOTTEST EVAH” figures and the old bull of reality raises its head from just munching the grass.
Add to the mix the use of modern electronic temperature sensors which pick up every temperature spike from every micro whirl of hot air passing by and you can adjust the number down a bit more.
Weaponsed crap is what this hoo haa really is.
Yep. It’s harder to compensate for that than you would think. One of our old systems had an analog alarm sensor that averaged the number of ‘hits’ using a capacitor. When the ‘hits’ dropped too low for too long, an alarm was sent.
The new digital system seemed to do the same thing mathematically but boy did the number of alarms ever increase. We were sending out a service tech every day just to confirm a false alarm.
The news media told us about the record heat in France, but did anyone report on the record cold in Russia?
https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019/07/25/snow-may-hit-moscow-region-next-week-while-europe-reels-from-heat-wave-a66573
https://www.iceagenow.info/record-cold-in-russia-2/
Mark,
RE:”…but did anyone report on the record cold in Russia?”
Only Joe Bastardi, at WeatherBell, that I know of….
andiceagenow.info for some time along with all the other cold snow etc events
and my american friend living in Ufa moaning at 10 to 12c and snow in summer;-)
their heating is nearly free and supplied by govt BUT the turn on/off dates are set and dont account for odd variant weather happening.
More extremes – worse fan thought – shows global climate distruption true – need to act now / sarc
I’m very, very tired of the same old BS from the climate calamity crowd shouting that hot is climate and cold is weather. Very tired indeed. This nonsense is long past it’s best by date. How about we focus the money and effort on solving real world problems that will make a difference in people’s quality of life rather than political agendas- just a silly thought I know there’s no money or glory in doing the right thing, sad but true.
How do you think I feel? It works on my nerves! I just can’t get a grip as to why people still insist this a real problem that needs to be tackled!
Location of station?
Length of service ?
Outside influences ?
Add another few deg F and they can match our local record .
“When yer dry ya fry ….”
Methinks the Paris of 1948 was a lot less urban than the Paris of 2019.
France is not like the united States in that France has been populated for millennia and at one time was the most populous city in the world. <b.The population was much larger in 1948 than today.
The population of Paris peaked around shortly before WW2, took a decade to reclaim that and then has been on significant decline since then, only turning up once the immigration inflows kicked in.
The area now known as the United States has been populated by millennia as well.
Just not by people who built cities.
Point taken. On the other hand, population ≠ development. Bangladesh is far more populated and dense than Luxembourg. How much surface was paved back then versus cobblestone or packed stone? What were buildings like back then versus today? We’re there more urban trees back then?
I think you are talking about the the City of Paris, which is a relatively tiny part of the whole metropolitan area and corresponds to the mid 19th century Paris. Greater Paris has grown enormously in the last seventy years.
The same applies to London, the outer edges were individual towns/villages. The city of London ( the original medieval city) is just over 1 square mile, Greater London is 606 square miles. For comparison Paris is 41 square miles.
To be fair, it does appear that something has changed since about 1975 (as shown in Fig. 1). That doesn’t mean that humans are responsible, but there does appear to be a kink in the trend(s), leading to an increasing slope in the last ~45 years. That should be addressed.
To be fair, the temp decreased from 47 to 75, then started back up. BUT … What is curious to me is …… what happened in 2000, where there is a break in the data and a steady climb from that point, while the rest of the globe was experiencing “the pause”.
I smell some good ol home cooked temperature data, made to order … and ain’t it beautiful?
Question … does the satellite data show a record for Paris as well?
Whatever happened to “weather is not climate?”
Only when it fits the narrative. Get with it!
In 1953 Cole Porter published a song, “I love Paris”. One of the lines is, “I love Paris in the summer—when it sizzles!”
We often overlook contemporary comments. Is this a case where a comment from 70 years ago reflects on what is being measured now? And puts it in perspective?
Too soon we forget that the Liberation of Paris during World War II occurred on August 25, 1944. And 3 years later, 1947, it was surely still a “dark” city with a scarcity of “heat trapping” automobiles, buildings and infrastructure …….. compared to what it now is.
If one adjusted for the horrendous increase in the Heat Island Effect from a “Paris of July 28, 1947” …….. to a “Paris of July 25, 2019” …….. Paris would surely have been far hotter in 1947.
” And 3 years later, 1947, it was surely still a “dark” city with a scarcity of “heat trapping” automobiles, buildings and infrastructure …….. compared to what it now is.”
So what about all the years in between, which did not exceed 40.4°C?
That is for the believer in magic CO₂ to explain.
Le jour de fièvre est arrivée.
Very tru Nick.
The population of Paris now is only about one tenth of the 1900 population so it is only logical that there is no UHI effect.
You bloody donkey.
Nick Stokes, ……. I thought you knew, ….. the French didn’t have thermometers that would measure air temperatures that exceeded ….. 21.41097°C …. prior to May 31st, 2012.
”If one adjusted for the horrendous increase in the Heat Island Effect from a “Paris of July 28, 1947” …….. to a “Paris of July 25, 2019” …….. Paris would surely have been far hotter in 1947.”
My thoughts exactly!
I bet there was almost no pavement back then.
Central Paris was paved in the 19th century. It is very compact dense city.
please don’t use this term > extreme weather
How about extreme fajitas?
http://media.agonybooth.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/06053827/flare.jpg
Evidence that this record temperature is in fact due to “climate change” can be shown by examining the list of LOW temperatures in France: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_extreme_temperatures_in_France#Low_Temperatures
…
Note that not a single one is in the 21st century. You have to go back 34 years into the past to find a record low temperature in all of France.
Climate is not static. It changes. Constantly and naturally over time. One day the ice age will return naturally, as it has repeatedly. 34 year wiggles in temperature are simply natural background noise during the Holocene interglacial period of 14,000 years.
Warmer Winters would appear to be a benefit.
34 whole years….can we even justify a data point for the last half century yet?
The 1947 heatwave mention interested me.
I am a keen follower of Bordeaux wines and Michael Broadbent in his Wine Guides speaks happily of the heatwave conditions in the growing period leading up to the 1947 vintage.
I can assure you from personal drinking experience that 1947 produced magnificent wines, and is often bracketed with 1945 and 1949 as wonderful post war vintages. The two ( warmer) decades of this century have done no harm to Bordeaux vintages.
2005, 2009,2010, 2012, 2015, 2016 etc. produced remarkable vintages.
More global warming please!
Thanks Herbert! That’s climate
whiningwining I can appreciate!“1947 produced magnificent wines”
Being a skeptic, I have to question that.
Can you please ship a mixed case to me.
I, and a couple of friends, will get back to you soon.
Thanks
In order to do a proper job you need samples from other good years to do the comparison properly.
The present weather pattern over France and other parts of Europe is almost identical as to what occurs every Summer here in South Australia.
Most of this State is desert, so when the weather pattern causes air to move South from the Tropics, it passes over the interior which is desert, and we get a heat wave.
It usually lasts three days, but if its a slow moving system then the
the hot weather lasts much longer.
Here in our retirement village in Gawler where it can reach 42 C, the only advice from the manager is to drink lots of water and stay indoors with the air conditioner on. No one dies.
MJE VK5ELL
We just spent 6 weeks touring Spain and Portugal. The cities are giant stone piles. There is little breeze and clouds were scarce. It was warmest in Madrid. If you were in a marble paved plaza surrounded by 4-6 floor stone buildings it was uncomfortable in the sun. Find shade and it’s OK. I suspect the reporting stations are not ideally situated unless you are selling fear. The addition of thousands of AC units in recent years has doubtless raised temperatures as well. Step outside the city or into a park and the temperature is easily 10 to 15 F cooler. Drive into the countryside and it is quite tolerable. People, locals and tourists, generally had no trouble and the streets and outdoor cafes are packed.
We stayed in B&B flats in the old central parts of the cities. Most of our rooms were not air conditioned. A portable fan was enough.
Don’t believe the hype.
The same in Germany. 42.6° C in Lingen, all time high? Nope. Here is why:
DWD, Deutscher Wetterdienst (German Met Office) denies that there is anything wrong with that station, blatantly ignoring their own rules. Manipulation at its best/worst. There are certainly more UHI like that around.
The record breaking hot temps in Paris were due to all the good looking french woman that country is noted for with their stylish way of dressing,especially in the summertime.
It is slow, slugging work, but I am now updating my 5-year-old analysis of the maximum temperature derived heat waves of 1, 3, 5 and 10 days of consecutive heat for the 5 main capital cities of Australia. These have long records, some from the 1860s and collectively they house some 90% of our population.
Here, the official line is that heatwaves are becoming longer, hotter and more frequent. My analysis, using simple algebra, clearly shows that these assertions are supported is few cases, but are quite wrong for the majority of combinations. The official position is unsupportable for the cities where most of us live.
I hope to post on WUWT shortly.
Geoff S
What a view it must be from the Eyefull Tower.
My first thought is that they are in serious need of a French version of the Surface Stations Project.
Here is a photograph of the Parc Montsouris weather station.
How far away is the lake? Its clearly hot as it is full of green algae.
The lake might alleviate a frost, but it won’t be heating air at 42°C!.
“So, why then do activists blame a single record high temperature, let alone a summer heatwave on climate change?”
They don’t. That is just a zombie strawman.
AGW doesn’t Cause them but it obviously is going to make them worse.
”“So, why then do activists blame a single record high temperature, let alone a summer heatwave on climate change?”
They don’t. That is just a zombie strawman.
……………………………………………………….
Garbage, they do that almost every day.
”AGW doesn’t Cause them but it obviously is going to make them worse.”
How exactly does global warming make a single record high temperature worse?
Heat waves and cold snaps are completely unrelated to GW. You have been shown enough historical evidence of that by now.
“they do that almost every day”
Show me one instance where the CAUSE of a heatwave, or a wildfire for that matter is claimed to be because of AGW.
“How exactly does global warming make a single record high temperature worse?”
Um…
Please refer to ex-Governor Brown of California for a start. Good grief, do you live under a rock?
But because you can’t provide a quote you are most likely just parroting what you think you read on some partisan blog. Well played.
First Google result:
“California’s Gov. Brown Again Blames Fires On Global Warming — He Couldn’t Be More Wrong”
https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/californias-gov-brown-global-warming-blame/
Now you are going to say that “Investor’s Business Daily” is a partisan blog.
” …both natural fluctuations or man-made forcings like land use and urbanization”
These are not forcings, but represent changes to the system. Only the Sun is a proper source of forcing. Calling changes to the system forcing is a bastardization of equivalence applied by consensus climate science to hide what equivalence means. Changes to the system can be considered equivalent to a change in forcing holding the system constant, but other than changes that affect albedo, they do not represent a physical change to the forcing. None the less, even a change in albedo can be considered a change in forcing while keeping albedo constant.
A simple test to determine what is and what is not forcing is to consider its effect in the absence of solar forcing. If it has no effect on the steady state, then it’s not forcing. Per Bode’s definition, forcing is the signal input to the system.
Be on the lookout for some interesting weather over NW Russia during early August that’s likely to get far less coverage in the press. As Polar air will drive down across the area and send temps well below there averages and may even bring the first snows of the season.
But, What was the humidity?
Mac
+1
What bothers me about all this is that the current media coverage of summer high temperatures announced in advance that “Europe is going to experience a record-setting heat wave”. My cynical side wonders to what extent this leads to numbers being gently nudged upwards by a degree or two, to match the overheated expectations.
It’s hard to observe the current state of climate science with becoming terminally cynical. They want “climate” to be hotter than ever, and they want droughts and floods and hurricanes and cyclones to be worse than ever, and the temptation to nudge and fudge the data to match expectations must be very strong. I worry that when science is enlisted in the service of politics, rigor might be left behind.
I watched a TV interview with the staff of a station in Kent which had set the previous UK record. They were getting quite excited at the idea they were going to break their own record. Like a sports team anticipating setting a new track or field record. It struck me that this was somewhat lacking in scientific detachment.
“It’s hard to observe the current state of climate science with[out] becoming terminally cynical.”
Isn’t that the truth !
What the CAGW advocates are doing to science is a real trajedy, and really harmful both to science and to the people of the Earth.
I guess it was hot climate that caused the Tour de France to stop the race 0n Friday and shorten the race today. Too much hot ICE.
It was a mud flow caused by a storm with heavy hail.
Snow in the Alps at 9000 ft is not uncommon.even in July or August.
Excellent post, Chris Martz Weather!
And, of course, the MSM and TWC failed to mention the 35F drop in only 48 hours. The Tour de France ended a day early because the mountain road washed out with hail and wet snow this weekend. Yep, climate change.
I sincerely hope that Paris manages to increase this record breaking temperature by 0.10°C every year for the next 40 years. And all during that time Paris’s winters starts 1 days earlier and ends 1 day later, while the minimum winter temperatures slide down at rate of 0.15°C per year.
Let them bleat about summer temperatures then.
Regarding Figure 5, the color coded map of Baltimore as of 3 PM 8/29/2018: This does not look like air temperature measured 2 meters above the surface. I don’t see a way to have an air temperature measuring device scan the 2 meter above surface level of a city like that, especially with that level of resolution.
As for high temperatures on that day in that area according to the National Weather Service, as reported in archived CF6 preliminary monthly climate data:
Philadelphia International Airport: 95 degrees F
Greater Wilmington (DE) Airport: 94 degrees F
Baltimore (downtown / “inner harbor” ?): 96 degrees F
Washington DC National Airport: 94 degrees F
Washington DC Dulles Airport: 94 degrees F
Regarding fig 5 (I don’t know how that was obtained), the cool areas are the forested/vegetated areas clearly seen on Google Maps. Obvious that vegetated areas are significantly cooler than concrete/asphalt/roofs, etc. The UHIE is a no-brainer & temps from those areas are biased upward.
https://www.google.com/maps/@39.3091029,-76.5925889,35441m/data=!3m1!1e3
If global warming is, in fact, global, how is it that places seem to be stuck in the middle of “Climate Normals?”
charts of Yakima Washington
Many cold records including subzero temperatures – in July – in Russia (a big place). Is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/record-cold-in-russia-2/
Clear evidence of NASA tampering with the USA temperature record ironing flat previous cool and warm extremes to make current warming look falsely exceptional – is this climate change?
https://notrickszone.com/2019/07/27/us-justice-also-needs-to-focus-on-fabricated-nasa-climate-dossier-that-aims-to-frame-co2-citizens/
https://notrickszone.com/2019/07/23/more-data-shenanigans-at-nasa-unadjusted-data-get-whole-new-definition-no-longer-raw-but-now-quality-controlled/
2019 ship of fools runs into anomalous 3m thick ice in the Baffin inlets, on 14 July. Is this climate change?
https://notrickszone.com/2019/07/19/2019-climate-ship-of-fools-run-into-3-meter-thick-ice-baffin-inlets-mid-summer-ice-extent-no-trend-in-50-years/
Anomalous snow in July in Poland – is this climate change?
https://notrickszone.com/2019/07/14/surprise-july-snow-falls-in-poland-june-temperature-trends-see-no-rise-across-canada-iceland/
In Peru one of the coldest winters in 50 years and fears of flu epidemic. Is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/peru-one-of-the-most-intense-winters-in-almost-50-years/
In Idaho hay price jumps on scarce supply due to cold wet spring – is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/idaho-hay-price-jump-and-short-supply/
Anomalous 2.5 foot snow closes Argentina’s Bariloche airport – is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/2%C2%BD-ft-of-snow-shuts-down-argentina-airport/
Strongest ever summer jet stream in NH when warming climate models predict weakening jet stream: is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/strongest-summer-jet-stream-to-hit-pacific-northwest-ever/
15 cold records broken in Queensland Australia: is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/fifteen-cold-records-broken-in-queensland/
Millions of acres not planted in US and China due to anomalous cold and rain in spring: is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/millions-of-acres-in-the-us-will-not-be-planted-this-year/
Record cold in Slovakia in July; is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/record-cold-in-slovakia-2/
Record cold in Northwest Russia in July 2019: is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/cold-record-in-northwestern-european-russia/
Record cold for all of Hungary – is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/record-cold-in-hungary/
Record cold in Brazil, 2019: is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/record-cold-in-brazil/
Would it surprise you Phil if it turned out there were far more record highs than record lows?
Phil Salmon
“Record cold for all of Hungary – is this climate change?
https://www.iceagenow.info/record-cold-in-hungary/”
*
The very best of this more or less ridiculous page has been a comment posted by:
” Lyn Jenkins [Mr], Wales ,UK.
July 12, 2019 at 11:03 am
Well, we have just returned from Genoa, N Italy.
Temps for a week from 29th June 2019 to 5th July were around 90 to 95 Fahrenheit.
We had those temps in Marseilles, Palma Majorca, Ibiza, Naples, Livorno and Genoa. ”
Very British humor.
*
Btw: here are the ten last anomalies wrt mean of 81-10 for the average of all HU stations of GHCN:
2018 9 2.06
2018 10 2.62
2018 11 3.05
2018 12 0.93
2019 1 0.56
2019 2 2.74
2019 3 3.02
2019 4 1.27
2019 5 -1.87
2019 6 3.75
Yeah. Record cold for all of Hungary!
We’ll see in a few days how July behaved. What would you bet?
I think you are talking about the the City of Paris, which is a relatively tiny part of the whole metropolitan area and corresponds to the mid 19th century Paris. Greater Paris has grown enormously in the last seventy years.
Metropolitan Area population has doubled between 1950 and 2020
Over time there have been different definitions for the Paris urban or Metroploitan area, but is is safe to say that it did not shrink….
“It’s indeed possible that the warmer atmosphere today as compared to the 1980s may have made this heatwave slightly more intense. ”
almost true by definition
“No”
That is not the conclusion the author came to at all. The way I read it, he was saying “I don’t know”, despite a whole article which admitted a long-term trend in maximum temperature increase and claimed that the science suggested this would lead to an increased probability of such heat waves.
I blame all those wind turbines in the Pyrenees and the Massive Central for the heat in Paris. If the wind was allowed to blow uninterrupted, the faster more constant air flow across France would ensure a moderated temperature regime. 🙂
Rod Evans
Then please do not forget to blame “all those wind turbines” along the Spanish coastal lines for the horribly cold period in Spain during May & June 🙂.
Very hot in the UK on Thursday, not sure what accuracy a car’s thermometer reads to, but it hit 37.5C. Certainly when you opened the car door, it felt like getting off the plane at Cairo airport!
Stayed hot too, so not just the Sun, heating things up.
However, by Saturday morning, 17.5C.
Raining steadily now, normal British summer has resumed.
London:
Thursday 38 C
Friday 28 C
Saturday 19 C
Is this climate change?
No !
It’s weather change, stu..d !
The Tour De-France was stopped yesterday, because of a heavy snow storm.
Hail storm. Hail storms in summer are not because it was cold.
Hail storm.
No. It was a hail storm.
These are mostly a consequence of the meeting of hot and cold air masses in front of mountains.
Sorry for my bad english, I am french.
In 1947, the temperature was measured in the old radiation shield of 1870 (Named “Montsouris”) :
http://education.meteofrance.fr/documents/10192/92670/21993-43.jpg/185x250x.pagespeed.ic.beoaoHXUBZ.jpg
http://education.meteofrance.fr/ressources-pour-les-enseignants/observer-et-mesurer/l-abri-meteo#
The median error of this radiation shield, is +2° with this weather condition and strong radiation in summer, up +3.5° (Tx) in the comparison of Météo France (MF) with a humid and not hot summer.
The Paris Montsouris park is automatically watered (not in 1947) and on record day it was watered in the morning. An old study said watering cooled the Tx by -0.5° on average in the summer at Montsouris.
http://www.meteo-paris.com/site/images/station_meteo_centenaire_omm_06.jpg
http://www.meteo-paris.com/actualites/2018-annee-la-plus-chaude-a-paris-et-besancon-18-decembre-2018.html
The problem in this station is too closed, with bad natural ventilation of the site and the shelter with trees that cut the wind. The masks shadows cool some of the Tx. The ICU is for the evening and the night temperatures, the Tn, not for the Tx in this park.
Another MF station in Paris -St Maur des Fossés recorded 43.6° (more closed that Montsouris)
Oh yes it is!
so are the records in Netherlands, Germany, Belgium and the UK!
and no, they weren’t rogue weather stations either (I happened to visit Cambridge Botanic Gardens just 2 weeks ago and the site there is just as it has been for a hundred years)
Apparentlly, 2002/3 are missing.
Missing data for the year 2003 in Paris
For Charles the Moderator & Chris Martz
I can understand that in the US nobody feels the need to have a closer look at graphs showing temperatures in France, let alone to remember in which years the country was hit by heat waves.
Nevertheless, I invite you both to look at the KNMI graph in Fig. 1:
You clearly can see an interesting hole in the graph, covering some years somewhere within 2000 / 2005.
This is no wonder. I suppose that like many other institutions, climate information web sites and blogs, KNMI obtains data from NOAA (GHCN monthly V3, now V4).
I use GHCN daily:
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/daily/
And there you see only one station for Paris, France in the station directory file ‘ghcnd-stations.txt’:
FR000007150 48.8231 2.3367 75.0 PARIS/LE BOURGET 07150
While, in the GHCN daily inventory file ‘ghcnd-inventory.txt’ you see for the station id ‘FR000007150’
FR000007150 48.8231 2.3367 TMAX 1900 2018
FR000007150 48.8231 2.3367 TMIN 1900 2018
FR000007150 48.8231 2.3367 TAVG 1983 2018
what indicates that Le Bourget has TMIN/TMAX since 1900, the data file itself
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/daily/all/FR000007150.dly
perfectly explains the KNMI hole: there is no TMIN/TMAX data available for this station between Jan 2001 and Sep 2004. And the lack of daily data is of course the reason for the same lack of data in the monthly series GHCN V3/V4.
Even Berkeley Earth shows a hole in its monthly data for the Paris station in the Parc Montsouris:
http://berkeleyearth.lbl.gov/auto/Stations/TAVG/Figures/13958-TAVG-Raw.png
Thus, 2003, the year which has very probably experienced the heaviest heat wave since temperature measurement in France, is clearly visible at many places in France, but… not in Paris.
To give an idea of how 2003 behaves in comparison with 1947, here is in the following a bit of stat coming from a descending sort of the TMAX values obtained from GHCN daily (there was also a heat wave in 1911 with about 40000 deaths, but at that time only 5 stations reported data).
12 of the top 20 for France were measured in 2003; 47 in the top 100, and 296 in the top 1000, reported by 44 stations.
For 1947 the numbers are: 3, 11 and 65, reported by 18 stations.
Thus, even if the measured temperatures’ averages were similar (38.8 °C in 1947, 38.6 in 2003), the 2003 heat period lasted longer on average in this top 1000 (6.7 days/station in 2003 vs. 3.7 in 1947).
We will see in a few weeks how 2019 behaves in comparison with 2003 and 1947. Imho, it will stay far far below 2003.
Regards
J.-P. D.
I would be interested to have a robust and reliably skeptical study of whether and, if so, how global warming would make this stalled front significantly hotter (over standard meteorological factors). Until then, I will question beliefs such as this one: “Like most scientists, I agree that climate change － both natural fluctuations or man-made forcings like land use and urbanization － should cause weather patterns and the intensity and/or frequency of extreme weather or weather-related events to change.” In this case agree = belief, without the scientific mechanics.
The difference between 28th July 1947 and 25th July 2019 are shown below and why the event was not due to climate change.
https://www.wetterzentrale.de/reanalysis.php?map=1&model=noaa&var=1&jaar=1947&maand=07&dag=28&uur=1200&h=0&tr=360&nmaps=24#mapref
https://www.wetterzentrale.de/en/reanalysis.php?map=1&model=cfsr&var=1&jaar=2019&maand=07&dag=25&uur=1200&h=0&tr=360&nmaps=24#mapref
The weather pattern introduced hot air moving up from North Africa on both days.
One difference occurred though where the isobars were tighter on the 2019 event due to low pressure off Ireland.
This brought stronger winds to the west of the high pressure system, bringing in increased hotter air further North and quicker into Europe. This window of opportunity for this energy moving north is limited to duration, so quicker flow makes the process more efficient. Hence, high pressure system slowly moving in different position after a short duration cuts the increased energy flow off.
Therefore the higher temperatures recorded were more related to this slight different weather pattern then any urbanisation difference during this time. Although one big influence on UHI usually not mentioned is the increase in the size of the buildings storing more energy that get slowly released during the day and especially at night.
Paris had mediocre maximum temperatures in 1976? Bullshit!
Hermit.Oldguy
Do you have kinda parallax problem?
The graph rather suggests 1977, and it’s correct, see top 5:
FR000007150 PARIS/LEBOURGET 1977 7 3 29.0
FR000007150 PARIS/LEBOURGET 1977 7 5 28.9
FR000007150 PARIS/LEBOURGET 1977 7 6 28.8
FR000007150 PARIS/LEBOURGET 1977 7 4 28.5
FR000007150 PARIS/LEBOURGET 1977 7 12 28.2
Heatwave / record cold?
Depends where you are…
https://electroverse.net/all-time-record-low-temperatures-tumble-in-northwest-russia/
It’s probably a case of the relatively well off squawking the most about a little discomfort
“Yes, the record was broken by an incredible amount; but hey, it’s Summer.”
Skepticism is fine, but not to the point where it becomes blinkered to the bias of people advocating it.
Fine: this Summer is just one data point, so to speak – but nothing in the above article actually debunked a global warming hypothesis.
Nice to see Griff and a few other like minded alarmists pretending there wasn’t any snow involved in halting the de France. Little defensive maybe? Most of the media, of course, did likewise….I didn’t know about the snow until today.
copy
3 days ago – Stage 19 of the Tour de France has ended in dramatic fashion with racing called to a halt due to a landslide plus ice and snow on the road. General … wielrenn…/tour-de-france/2019/etappe-19/ pic.twitter.com/b8BenVros9.