Finally an explanation why, if the world is warming up, bone-sapping winter cold snaps seem in an unscientific survey of my own memory to be getting more frequent.

The NYTimes‘s Andrew C. Revkin at his Dot Earth blog yesterday was among the first out of the gate on a new Arctic Report Card that NOAA posted on line.  It says – he says – that as the Arctic warms up the vortex of winds that tend to keep its wintry chill cooped up get weaker. And it’s still really cold up there, but now the refrigerator door is ajar and more of the gelid air can slosh down into Europe, Siberia, and North America.

*UPDATE 1:

Stephen Leahy, a freelancer and Inter Press Service correspondent, notes in his comment below he had the essence of this news back in June. He’s pretty much right about that, although when NOAA gives the report card its imprimatur that does mark a fresh turn in the story.

More notable is that he is among the relatively few enviro and climate change reporters who gets himself to many major meetings. This one he filed from Oslo.

It’s further worth reading his piece to note, at the website where he posted it in that link above, his recent one-man foray into Community Supported Journalism, to adopt his manner of capitalizing the term. When he doesn’t have an assignment paying his way, he asks his regular readers for donations to cover his costs, not to mention a part of his rent and general income. Contributions came from an international array of experts, not just a US crew. This is a sign of the times, although he concedes it has not yet meant big money. Some donors are sending him money – less than $5000 in all so far this year but that’s something. He also gets invitations from his readers, many of them international, to stay in their homes while on the road. He’s accepted several. What some people won’t do to keep their beat alive. It’s impressive, and chancy. Good luck, Mr. Leahy.

Original post continues:

This also might explain why Alaska was so relatively balmy last winter when the eastern US suffered periodic Arctic Clippers. Every time cold air broke out of the hyperboreal regions, warm air from the south surged up to replace it.  I guessed as much.

The NOAA report seems to be a regurgitation of info that’s been in wide circulation for a long time.  The gist – the old Arctic is gone, taken out by fading permafrost, thin ice, warm water, and an invasion of the Arctic Ocean by creatures of the south. Given however  the recent battering that scientific consensus on climate change has gotten in popular culture, it’s a good thing to see this report getting some attention. Also given that recent battering, one doubts the report will change the minds of many (see anon-science but pertinent story in NYTimes this week by John Broder: Climate Change Doubt Is Tea Party Article of Faith. )

More Arctic Report Card Stories:

• USA Today/ScienceFair blog – Dan Vergano: NOAA: Arctic Melting may point to future bad winters ;
• Reuters – Deborah Zabarenko: Warmer Arctic Probably Permanent, Scientists Say ;
• Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin: Arctic is warming, NOAA report says ;
• E&E ClimateWire via NYTimes – Lauren Morello: The Arctic Shifts to a New Climate Pattern in Which ‘Normal’ Becomes Obsolete ; Best hed of the bunch. Lucid description of ‘polar amplification.’

*UPDATE 2:

• See also World Policy Blog – Alun Anderson (Oct. 15) : The Great Melt: The Coming Transformation of the Arctic ; A long report on the same general topic. Anderson is former editor-in-chief of New Scientist. Vivid, dire turns of phrase here – such as warning that the Arctic is beginning a “long, slow, painful revenge” for the changes forced upon it, “a punishment that we humans are very bad at dealing with – spread over hundreds of years and almost completely unstoppable.” Gad. That doesn’t sound good. This is not a conventional, quick impressionistic blog-vent, but a well-polished essay with a clear, perhaps arguable and still disturbing, point of view.

Grist for the Mill: NOAA Press Release;  Arctic Report Card ;

- Charlie Petit

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