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General: Global wetting?

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    Just where is all of this rain coming from? Is the current wet weather we are seeing in the UK explainable in the context of climate change? or is it just a blip in what was touted as being one of the hottest summers on record?
    • CommentAuthortony
    • CommentTimeJul 19th 2007
     
    No , weather is weather. I would like it to get a bit warmer. It should be summer now.
  3.  
    I heard that the Jet Stream which is a wind system, a bit like the gulf stream in the sea, has shifted to the South, sending the storms that would normally pass to the north of the British Isles wetting scotland, orkney & shetland etc. further south and giving us all this wet weather. The usual summer high pressure that brings us July heat has also shifted to the South, causing the heatwave that southern Europe is suffering, with fires in Greece etc.
    I am sure it has been blamed on climate change.
    It may turn out that the global average temerature is still high or the highest year on record.
    Kind of emphasises the importance of 'climate change' or (climate chaos might be more appropriate) as a description, as opposed to 'Global Warming'
    higher temperatures cause more evaporation from the land as well as the sea, worsening droughts in some areas while torrential deluges and flooding in others.

    Reminds me of something a man said in a paper shop, back in Spring when it was really hot,
    "If this is Global Warming, bring it on!"
    It hasn't stopped raining since.
    • CommentAuthorBluemoon
    • CommentTimeJul 20th 2007
     
    I just looked at a weather statistics website, the average rainfall forr July in my area is 51mm, we had 35mm in the past 24hours. If the Jet Stream is the cause, it had better shift back up north.
  5.  
    A weather forcaster was asked on the BBC tonight if he could explain why our weather is so bad. The forecaster stated that the 'azores' high, which normally settles around the UK is stuck out in the Atlantic, and has been since late March. He made no link to Climate change, and could not explain why the 'high' was showing no sign of coming our way, only more rain!

    Here's another view http://www.dhpc.uklinux.net/dhpc/News_Items/2002/azoreshigh.htm

    I realise this is an uncomfortable question for some here but what I would like to know is if the science about climate change is so unarguable, why does the current weather not fit the predicted pattern?
    • CommentAuthorbiffvernon
    • CommentTimeJul 23rd 2007
     
    It comes down to an understanding of the difference between climate and weather. Do not confuse the two. The atmosphere is a chaotic dynamic system that operates within probability bounds. Climate change shifts those bounds but that does not mean that a particular period of weather can be linked to climate change. It is tempting to say that getting a 100-year flood twice in a fortnight must be due to climate change, but it might not.

    Also, one cannot blame the current weather on the jet stream's seasonably unusual southern bend. Everything is connected to everything else. The jet stream has been shifted because a mass of arctic air has moved south on our side of the globe. And that is because a mass of tropical air has pushed northwards on the other side of the world. And that is because the La Nina current has....and so on. It is possible that such conditions are more likely when there is more heat in the system, but that is conjecture. What we do see for certain is the greatest ever melting of Arctic ice on the Canadian and Alaskan side of the Arctic Ocean.

    Now let's concentrate on stilt designs for all those houses that our government insists will have to be built in flood plains, mindful of the fact that flood plains will flood no matter what happens with global warming.
  7.  
    Thanks Biff, that's a very objective assessment.
    • CommentAuthorbiffvernon
    • CommentTimeJul 23rd 2007
     
    Steady on, Mike. You'd better read this from today's Independant:
    http://environment.independent.co.uk/climate_change/article2793067.ece
  9.  
    Hmm, not sure about that one Biff, seem like a bit of a leap to me. Perhaps the coming report will provide something more concrete
    • CommentAuthorbiffvernon
    • CommentTimeJul 23rd 2007
     
    It's like saying lattitude causes snow. Aberdeenshire gets more snow than Devon. That doesn't mean that Devon can't get a lot of snow occassionally.

    There again, there have been record breaking floods in Pakistan, India, Bangla Desh and southern China this year. The top story on today's Chinadaily.com puts our little problems into perspective:

    http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-07/22/content_5441057.htm
    • CommentAuthortony
    • CommentTimeJul 23rd 2007
     
    The last line of the article two posts up,"Global warming is likely to lead to higher rainfall because a warming atmosphere contains more water vapour and more energy. Since climate prediction began 20 years ago, heavier rainfall over Britain has been a consistent theme.

    How come we have been having a drought and water shortages then for the past few years?
    • CommentAuthorbiffvernon
    • CommentTimeJul 23rd 2007
     
    Drought? We haven't.

    Except in south-east England. There's been plenty of rain oop north.
  13.  
    I Just saw an explanation on the ITV news about the link with climate change. The 'expert' talked a lot about the jet stream and how it is further South than normal. Also talked about a new study which split the Globe into bands and measured percentage rainfall. He somehow came to the conclusion that there was a link between the current wet spell and Climate change. Unfortunately he proved absolutely nothing.

    Anyone else see it? Did I miss something?
  14.  
    The only way we will know if these recent events are linked to global warming is to look back at the developing pattern of weather events in 2 or 3 decades time. They are the kind of freak events that are predicted to become more common as the climate warms but freak weather events have always occurred.

    What events like these do, is to bring home to people the likely consequences of allowing AGW to continue unabated (I even got my mother to watch "An Inconvenient Truth" this afternoon...). It is the same with Peak Oil, i.e. we'll only start swapping SUVs for rail tickets when we've had fuel shortage like in the '70s.
    • CommentAuthorEdF
    • CommentTimeJul 25th 2007
     
    So, would anyone like a sloping building plot 550 feet up in the Highlands? I'll throw in a bike but it's 17 miles to Tesco.. No floods here, and although summers are often dull and a bit wet, we don't have summer flooding so maybe the Jetstream is normally further north than the mainland? Whatever the cause, is it a trend? Will it get worse..?? I believe the answer is - yes..

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