November 2018 climate update for Grand Rapids, Michigan, goes from hot to cold like someone flipped a switch

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for November 2018:

Max temp 52 (lowest on record), Mean Max temp 66

Min temp 20, Mean Min temp 17

Av temp 34.6 (10th coldest on record), Mean Av temp 39.1

Precip 2.73, Mean precip 2.84

Snow 14.4, Mean snow 6.3

Heating Degree Days 908, Mean HDD 770

By heating degree days, November 2018 was 18% colder than normal and the 10th coldest November on record.

Barack Obama lets one go: "Suddenly America's like the biggest . . . gas, that was me, people"

Here.

Whooooooweeeeee, that one smells:

CNN, December 1, 2010: Obama bans eastern Gulf drilling for 7 years

House Committee on Natural Resources, Washington DC, November 8, 2011: Obama Administration Imposes Five-Year Drilling Ban on Majority of Offshore Areas 

Investor's Business Daily, October 16, 2012: Gas Prices Doubled, Obama Locks Up National Reserve

House Committee on Natural Resources Timeline: AMERICAN ENERGY ROADBLOCKS BY THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION 2009-2013

Climate Change News, January 27, 2015: Obama bans oil drilling in 9.8 million acres of Arctic ocean

WaPo, March 20, 2015: Obama administration tightens federal rules on oil and gas fracking

NYT, June 22, 2016: Obama Fracking Rule Is Struck Down by Court:

The blocked rule would not have affected most fracking operations in the United States, since it would have applied only to fracking on federal lands. The vast majority of fracking in the United States — almost 90 percent — is done on state and private land and is governed by state and local regulations. The rule was unlikely to have stopped most new fracking on public lands, although oil and gas companies complained that it could have slowed operations by creating burdensome paperwork.

BBC, December 21, 2016: Obama bans oil drilling 'permanently' in millions of acres of ocean

NYT, October 27, 2018: Driven by Trump Policy Changes, Fracking Booms on Public Lands

The peers must be incompetent: Peer-reviewed ocean warming paper in premier journal found to have big math boo-boo

From the story here:

However, the conclusion came under scrutiny after mathematician Nic Lewis, a critic of the scientific consensus around human-induced warming, posted a critique of the paper on the blog of Judith Curry, another well-known critic.

“The findings of the ... paper were peer reviewed and published in the world’s premier scientific journal and were given wide coverage in the English-speaking media,” Lewis wrote. “Despite this, a quick review of the first page of the paper was sufficient to raise doubts as to the accuracy of its results.”

Co-author Ralph Keeling, climate scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, took full blame and thanked Lewis for alerting him to the mistake. ...

“Our error margins are too big now to really weigh in on the precise amount of warming that’s going on in the ocean,” Keeling said. “We really muffed the error margins.”

A correction has been submitted to the journal Nature.

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for October 2018

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for October 2018:

Max temp 84, Mean Max temp 79

Min temp 27, Mean Min temp 28

Av temp 50.4, Mean Av temp 51.3

Precip 5.69, Mean precip 3.00 (year to date 39.73, 5.21 above the mean annual 34.52)

Cooling Degree Days 20, Mean CDD 9, Season to date 1003, Mean Season to date 690.

The cooling season to date as measured by CDD has been 45% warmer than the mean to date.

Season to date 2018 is 7th warmest on record for total CDD:

1921: 1200

1931: 1061

2012: 1039

1936: 1022

1934: 1007

1933: 1004

2018: 1003

1939:   972.

There have been five months in a row in 2018 with max temps in the 90s, the first time that has happened since 1991.

Laugh of the Day: Christian Science Monitor suggests "alien invasion" could unite Americans, or "climate change"

Talk about being out of touch.

The latest invasion is on the way from Honduras as we speak and the last thing I expect to see is Democrats and Republicans unite to stop it.

Instead Democrats intend to welcome the invasion with open arms.

Here:

The parties could also unite to solve an overarching national goal. The problem here is, what? Absent an alien invasion requiring Americans to pull together, what goal would suffice? Some experts suggest climate change, but that would require Republicans to change position and favor more active intervention on the issue.

The President of the World declares a global emergency

Gore: Jet Stream 'Getting Loopier and Wavier,' So 'We Have a Global Emergency'

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for September 2018

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for September 2018

Max temp 90, Mean Max temp 89

Min temp 40, Mean Min temp 37

Av temp 66.1, Mean Av temp 62.7

Precip 5.93, Mean precip 3.57 (quack quack, another gullywasher)

Cooling Degree Days 135, Mean CDD 76, Season to date 983, Mean Season to date 690

The cooling season to date as measured by CDD is now 42% warmer than the mean to date. Season to date 2018 is now 7th warmest on record for total CDD. The warmest year on record was 1921 with 1200 CDD. The 2nd warmest year on record was 1931 with 1061 CDD. It is highly unlikely that 2018 will finish warm enough to crack the number two spot but will be firmly in the top ten warmest years by CDD. There have been five months in a row in 2018 with max temps in the 90s, the first time that has happened since 1991.

The New Yorker ignores how wildfires contribute gargantuan quantities of emissions compared with power plants

A Summer of Megafires and Trump’s Non-Rules on Climate Change:

Compared with the Clean Power Plan, [the EPA's new Affordable Clean Energy rules] could, over the next few decades, allow hundreds of millions of tons of additional carbon emissions.

Hundreds of millions of tons over decades, eh?

How about gigatons from wildfires in just one year?

Forest fires may produce as much CO2 as half of all fossil fuels burned:

In 1997, a fire consumed 8,000 square kilometers of mostly peatland in Borneo. Researchers estimated 0.2 Gt of carbon were released in this one area that year, and that carbon emissions from fires across Indonesia in 1997 emitted between 0.8 and 2.5 Gt — or “13 to 40%” of the size of global human fossil fuel emissions. ... 

Other researchers, der Werf et al 2004, looked at fires around the world during the El Nino year and estimated that 2.1 Gt of carbon was released — which explained 66% ± 24% of the extra CO2 emitted globally that year. Bowman et al estimate fires produced emissions around 50% of the size of human emissions. ...

California, Nevada and Colorado could impact climate far more deeply, cheaply and effectively RIGHT NOW by preventing and containing the wildfires which are making moot the comparatively puny plans of the EPA.

Average temperature in Grand Rapids, Michigan, in 2018 through August has been about 38% warmer than the mean

Months in 2018 ranked for highest average monthly temperature in 127 years (since 1892):

Jan: 54th

Feb: 21st

Mar: 56th

Apr: 123rd (4th lowest average temperature on record for April)

May: 4th highest average temperature on record for May

Jun: 29th

Jul: 21st

Aug: 11th

Average for 2018 to date: about 40th (mean is about 64th; six years numbered 62-67 populate the mean annual average temperature record of 48.2).

So overall to date conditions have been about 38% warmer than the mean in Grand Rapids (2400/64), which is the same result obtained from analysis of the Cooling Degree Day data.

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for August 2018

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for August 2018

Max temp 91, Mean Max temp 92

Min temp 52, Mean Min temp 47

Av temp 73.5, Mean Av temp 70.2

Av temp to date 51.5, Mean Av temp to date 49.6 (actual is elevated 3.8%)

Precip 6.61, Mean precip 3.07

Total precip to date 28.11, Mean total precip to date 22.77 (actual ahead by 23%)

Cooling Degree Days 271, Mean CDD 189, Season to date 848, Mean Season to date 614

The cooling season to date as measured by CDD is now 38% warmer than the mean, up just a little from last month.

To stay cool, I've averaged 1074 kWh a month in June, July and August running the air conditioning versus 701 a month on average in the previous eight months, 53% more but for only three months. Every kWh above 600 in the summer months is billed at a rate almost 35% higher than for the first 600, but it really doesn't amount to much of a penalty. In August, for example, the kWh above 600 cost me a penalty surcharge of less than $15.00.

Overall, the price of staying cool in my case (74 degrees F) means operating anyway in the higher rate category. Even without running the AC I'm in it because I average 701 a month, 101 a month more than the arbitrary 600 ceiling. I'd pay the higher rate like it or not simply by running floor fans and ceiling fans. Running the toaster in summer makes breakfast slightly more expensive. This summer the extra 1119 kWh I've used above my non-summer average, due mostly to running the AC, have run me a relatively low additional $142.49 total, or $47.50 a month, all paid at the penalty rate.

A small price to pay to sleep well and remain fully functional, productive and healthy under somewhat less than ideal conditions in the summer of 2018.  

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for July 2018

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for July 2018

Max temp 94, Mean Max temp 94

Min temp 54, Mean Min temp 49

Av temp 74.4, Mean Av temp 72.2

Av temp to date 48.3, Mean Av temp to date 46.6 (actual is elevated 3.6%)

Precip 2.30, Mean precip 3.12

Total precip to date 21.5, Mean total precip to date 19.7 (actual ahead 1.8 despite dry conditions)

Cooling Degree Days 301, Mean CDD 241, Season to date 577, Mean Season to date 425

The cooling season to date as measured by CDD has moderated to 35.76% warmer than the mean after a hot early start to the summer season.

I notice Mean Max temp for June 2018 has been altered/changed/corrected down to 91 from the 94 I reported. It's also possible I misread it.

Check, check, double check, but still discrepancies arise due to human error . . . just not sure whose. 

Governor Moonbeam is clueless about how much warmer it was in Greco-Roman antiquity than today

Jerry Brown, quoted here:

The governor added that "since civilization emerged 10,000 years ago, we haven’t had this kind of heat condition, and it’s going to continue getting worse and that’s the way it is."

Drought conditions return to the southwest US, this time to Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and Colorado

Mid-July 2017

Mid-July 2018

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for June 2018

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for June 2018

Max temp 94, Mean Max temp 94

Min temp 48, Mean Min temp 43

Av temp 69.9, Mean Av temp 67.7

Precip 2.50, Mean precip 3.54

Snowfall 0, Mean snowfall T, Season final 77.7, Mean Season 66.7

Heating Degree Days 12, Mean HDD 54, Season final 6456, Mean Season 6705

Cooling Degree Days 168, Mean CDD 139, Season to date 276, Mean Season to date 184

The heating season has finished 3.7% warmer than the mean using HDD as a measure. It ranked 32nd warmest since 1904.

The cooling season to date as measured by CDD has moderated to 50% warmer than the mean after a hot early start to the summer season. 

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for May 2018

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for May 2018

Max temp 94, Mean Max temp 86

Min temp 40, Mean Min temp 32

Av temp 64.8, Mean Av temp 57.9

Precip 5.64, Mean precip 3.46

Snowfall 0, Mean snowfall .2

Heating Degree Days 105, Mean HDD 252

Cooling Degree Days 108, Mean CDD 39

The cooling season has started off like a rocket, 240% warmer than mean to date based on CDD. With one month left to go in the heating season, the heating season as a result has now been 3.1% warmer than mean to date based on HDD.  

Meanwhile the trend toward lower minimum temperatures and lower maximum temperatures remains pronounced in Grand Rapids, Michigan: 3 degrees F lower over the last 120 years

Trend for average temperature in Grand Rapids, Michigan, indicates warming of about +0.5 degrees F over the last 120 years

That's it.

The not-much-of-a-muchness of it suggests that the growth of heat island effects could easily account for the observed results.

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for April 2018

Grand Rapids, Michigan, Climate Update for April 2018

Max temp 74, Mean Max temp 79

Min temp 16, Mean Min temp 22

Av temp 40.1, Mean Av temp 46.5

Precip 2.85, Mean precip 3.30

Snowfall 6.0, Mean snowfall 2.4

Heating Degree Days 740, Mean HDD 553

Using HDD, the cold season to date has been just 1% warmer than the mean. Season to date HDD were 6339 vs. season to date mean of 6403.

New study in Journal of Climate says future warming to be 30-45% lower than projected by IPCC models

Uh huh.

Reported here.

IPCC puts global warming at +1.53 degrees F 1880-2012, over 3.8 times what it was in Grand Rapids, Michigan

The average temperature trend in Grand Rapids, Michigan shows warming of about only 0.4 degrees F over the 120-year record from 1898 through 2017, according to NOAA online weather data for the station. The relatively small increase combined with the recency of the highs for the data series, however, makes one wonder about possible interference from developing heat island effects at the station, which is located near the increasingly busy Ford International Airport.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change figure of 1.53 degrees F is referenced here.

The data for Grand Rapids is shown below.