This blog has cautioned readers before that land surface temperatures are on the rise and noted a disturbing trend: “When compared with the average surface moisture from 1950 to 2000, computer models projected about a 15% decline in surface moisture from 2021 to 2040.”
Professor Joe likes how Steve Scolnik put together the statistical aggregation across the country “since it gets us beyond the oft-repeated point that you can’t pin any one record temperature on global warming. It shows that in more recent decades record high temperatures far outpace record lows across U.S.
“Total number of daily high and low temperature records set in the U.S., data from NOAA National Climatic Data Center, background image © Kevin Ambrose. Includes historical daily observations archived in NCDC’s Cooperative Summary of the Day data set and preliminary reports from Cooperative Observers and First Order National Weather Service stations. All stations have a Period of Record of at least 30 years.”
Climate Progress commentator prokaryote notes, “Heatwave creates drought which in turn leads to famine. And, says Stanford scientists, the U.S. can expect more heat waves.
Devastating heat waves that result in fatalities and crop losses may increasingly become a common occurrence in the United States over the next three decades, according to a team of Stanford University researchers.
“Using a large suite of climate model experiments, we see a clear emergence of much more intense, hot conditions in the U.S. within the next three decades,: Noah Diffenbaugh, the lead author of the study, told the Stanford Report.
“In the next 30 years, we could see an increase in heat waves like the one now occurring in the eastern United States or the kind that swept across Europe in 2003 that caused tens of thousands of fatalities,” said Diffenbaugh, a center fellow at Stanford’s Woods Institute for the Environment. “Those kinds of severe heat events also put enormous stress on major crops like corn, soybean, cotton and wine grapes, causing a significant reduction in yields.”
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Mike Millikin informs us that the NOAA is predicting drought conditions in Southwest US to worsen.
“NOAA’s National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center seasonal drought outlook for the period from August through October indicates already dry conditions across parts of Arizona and New Mexico are likely to worsen in coming months. The official outlook calls for current severe drought conditions to persist across north-central portions of New Mexico and northeast Arizona while developing across much of the remainder of Arizona and extreme western parts of New Mexico.”
Last month was the hottest June recorded worldwide and US government climate data suggests 2010 on course to be warmest year since records began. And, please recall, this is from what we already have put into the atmosphere and not what we insist on continuing to spew into the atmosphere.
“NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) has posted its State of the Climate, Global Analysis for June. The results confirm NASA’s: The first half of 2010 breaks the thermometer.
Climate Progress relays NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) State of the Climate, Global Analysis. It was the warmest June on record for the land surfaces of the globe. Previous record was set in 2005. The land surface temperature exceeded the previous record by 0.11?C (0.20?F). This large difference over land contributed strongly to the overall global land and ocean temperature anomaly.
CP commentator Jeff Masters:
SciAmz David Biello wants to know, “How Much Global Warming Are We Willing to Take?”
Susan Solomon of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration warns, "Because carbon dioxide is so long-lived in the atmosphere, it could effectively lock Earth and future generations into warming not just for decades and centuries, but literally for thousands of years,"
According to a new National Research Council report:
Even some mainstream media, like USA Today, covers the story.
“Russia’s worst drought in a decade has damaged more than half of grain planted in eleven regions.”
A heat wave of unprecedented intensity has brought the world’s largest country its hottest temperature in history.
How hot is it? “It’s so hot,” sez Professor Joe, “the Washington Post almost gets the story right!”
What story you might ask? “Masters reports nine countries have smashed all-time temperature records,” “making 2010 the year with the most national extreme heat records.”
And, to repeat the warning from atmospheric scientist Susan Solomon of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration:
“By mid-century climate change will mean a high or extreme risk of water shortages in 14 states, according to a new study commissioned by the Natural Resources Defense Council… One-third of U.S. counties will face at least some higher risks of water shortages, with 400 counties at extremely high risk.”
While the drought in Russia may be shriveling crops, we should note that a 100-degree August heatwave gripping America’s heartland is hurting corn yield and pushing up soybean futures as “crops are going downhill rapidly.”
The “waters atop Lake Superior reached the highest temperature ever recorded” and “Lake Mead, the enormous reservoir of Colorado River water that hydrates Arizona, Nevada, California and northern Mexico, is receding to a level not seen since it was first being filled in the 1930s.”
“Arizona farmers especially are at risk. Eventually, all water consuming industries and even residential property values could be. Those waiting for a return to a ‘normal’ precipitation regime face the invisible elephant in the room: climate change.”
India, where it can get really hot, is “currently losing nearly two per cent of the total milk production due to rise in heat stress among cattle and buffaloes because of the global warming,” according to the Business Standard.