MONDAY 3 AM

LATE WEEK SNOWS LIKELY IN LONDON

Okay thaw is over.. time for more fun and games.

The next 5 days will find the upper ridge popping back northwest over Iceland which turns Great Britain into an Iceland. I think the heaviest snows of the season are on the way for the southeastern part of Great Britain ( London) as the deep northeast flow and the very chilly air coming over the water picks up plenty of moisture and the snow flies a new later Thursday into Friday. In any case as we approach Valentines day we find much of Europe in classic cold with the mid and late week maps featuring and icelandic high pressure aloft and plenty of low pressure aloft from Spain to the Balkans and the drainage southwest of cold air back into the west. Make sure you have something, and someone to keep you warm.

ciao for now ****

FRIDAY 10 PM

HADLEY CENTER OFF TO A GREAT START IN 2010.

EL NINO AND BLOCKING ROCK THE EARTHS TEMP!

The objective measurement by satellites since the late 70s is what I look at and its off to a very warm start. This is good news for the Hadley center. The fact is that I want the right answer in this debate and so I will report to you whatever I see going on. When I disagree with someone, as I did the winter forecast for Europe, I will state my opinion. I think that 2010 will not be the hottest year on record for the earth, at least not by Satellite measurements as cooling is already starting but for now, there is plenty of reason to understand that while many humans shiver, the planet had a warm month!

And again you have to understand that part of the reason I bet the cold card here was because of the blocking and the type of el nino that came after 2 years of a consistent cold PDO! The arctic by the way will reverse in mid and late summer, get colder than normal as the el nino falls away, the earths temp will drop, but you will find much of europe with a hotter than normal summer! You see why this climate stuff is important to understand for the weather?

Anyway:

The latest global temp of PLUS .72 C is getting close to where the 98 el nino got us. THIS IS A CORRECT TEMPERATURE!!! The cold is where the cold is, over the major population centers of eastern and southern US, Europe and the far east. But it is that warm because of the rise of the earths temps in the tropical pacific and the blocking over the top.

However the fall that is coming will be major within 2 years and this drop will probably lead to several months below normal earth temps in 2011 or 2012

Look, I want the right answer in this global warming debate and we knew , based on the warmest Jan in the past 10 years that this was coming.. though the drop in December was interesting ( El ninos dont usually have that drop) But I want you to watch these temps, the objective satellite measurements, they are accurate and we dont have to worry about the rewriting of history that is going on in other things.

Where- ever the truth lies, that is where we should go! For the planet as a whole just another reason with all the cold where it is to understand why this subject needs debate, not the book shut on it!

Here is the link:

http://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/

And by the way, this is why you cant say that the winter being so cold is a sign of it cooling just as other things are a sign of warming. I will end this the way I always do. You see where we were back in the late 70s. That where I THINK, not know, but THINK we are going the next 20-30 years. We will have our answer then as the PDO now cold, and the AMO shift, plus the sunspot cycles and volcanic activity. If it gets back there, then we know co2 is not the cause. In the meantime we arent going to burn up the planet or do anymore harm than we are doing now with other things, not climate related.

So while you are shivering the next few weeks, for the planet, it was a field day for the heat!

Good to see a victory for the side of the warmingistas... they needed one. I want this debate to keep going and what we dont need is a mob routing of one side... They would do well to be a bit more open minded also, though I see they are already cooing about it. Its who can out nasty the other one.

ciao for now

FRIDAY NOONISH

AS THE COLD RETURNS.. PONDER THIS:

You think someone might be trying to tell someone something about longer-term weather patterns? Or will the events that will lead to the coldest Euro/USA combined winter in at least 25 years, and perhaps event longer, without a hint of such occurrence in the climate models, be swept under the rug?

Or will something that has led to such an obvious cold event be then blamed on warming... or how do we say it now... climate change? Given the cast of characters and their antics as far as the whole global warming house of cards, don't be surprised.

By the way, I see the head of the UN IPCC is an author of the kind of books I don't read... Interesting. I guess he has moved from writing what apparently has been a horror novel... or if you will, a fairy tale, with his co-authors about climate, to this. We all wish him the best of luck in this endeavor, since when you write such things, fantasy is allowed. It isn't in science.

So here is what enquiring (or is it inquiring? I always get that mixed up..lol) minds want to know...

If Al Gore had his movie, this guy has his "smutty novel," will other players in this fable follow?

Ciao for now.

***

THURSDAY 6 P.M.

THE U.S. CLIMATE MODELS SEEM TO BE SEEING THINGS COLDER THAN HADLEY.

Hopefully, they have thrown in the towel on what will turn out to be a top-10 cold winter for England in the last 50 years, and a top-5 farther east and south.

But for those thinking warmth is on the way, the U.S. model begs to differ:

http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/people/wwang/cfs_fcst/images3/euT2mMon.gif

It has less problem seeing cold, at least in Europe.

Ciao for now.

WEDNESDAY 6 P.M.

REPORTS OF WINTERS DEMISE GREATLY EXAGGERATED

Let me be gentle to some of you emailing me that winter is over.

The WORST of it is. I stated we would be back and forth in northwestern Europe, and it would be colder than normal, but the worst of winter when it's all said and done will be where we had it. But since this is supposedly the coldest December-January in Scotland, it better darn well be not as cold as it was. But it's not over, and the back-and-forth is working just fine.

But guess what, a week from today, it's winter again. I have been occupied over here in a dog fight with people that thought our thaw was the end of winter, which February will prove it was not.

But let's hope the adage... what happened in December, the winter will remember, works to a point to make my point, but not so much that we are in the deep freeze again. Winter has a long way to go, but I think for England and France, what happened earlier was tougher than what is coming, and that was the subject of a post a couple of weeks ago, and I thought that would take care of that.

And by the way, your warm-up is nothing compared to the U.S. I mean you have to be kidding me, some of you. Has it been so cold that normal is now warm (in London's case, 1 below normal since Jan. 15 after almost 8 below normal before)? You have been hit with too much global warming talk and you are having a severe overreaction. Or perhaps you have thought that two weeks of normal is warm, because people who told you it was going to be warm this winter have you convinced of that. One below normal is colder than normal.. 1 above is warmer. It is what it is. The totality of the winter forecast December-February, and I don't care how the Hadley Center spins it, is not mild. If it was 4 above normal, you can be sure there would be snickering all over the place. Even now their global forecast the next three months looks like someone simply painted the whole world warm and dropped some cool spots in it.

I am telling you, the forecast on their site HAD NO COLD ANYWHERE in Europe before the winter and they better understand that the correction of the cold bias when the PDO was warm, or the Atlantic was in a warmer mode, does not work. There are other things that drive the weather than just what is in a model... especially since the variables that make up the models' forecast may be pushed by bigger, non programmable, variables.

In any case, for those of you that think winter is over... make sure you wait before you put away your woolies, you will need them next week again, since apparently normal temps are easy to handle.

Ciao for now. ***

MONDAY 9 P.M.

HEH, LOOK THIS OVER!

Heh, folks, look at this: http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/

If you want to monitor Earth's temps objectively, here you are. It looks like January was a warm month for the Earth, as it is running .27F warmer than last year at this time for the 30th. I went back and looked at the last 10 years, and I think a spike is on the way in the global temps when they come in. This is what I love to look at; I don't have to worry about "adjustments" that take place.

Neither should you. It is what it is!

FRIDAY 11 P.M. LONDON TIME

A THEORY ON WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE CLIMATE MODELS.

The U.S.-generated CFS for the month of January on its last "nowcast" had most of the United States more than 5 above normal for the month on January. Nothing could be farther from the truth in reality. A spot check of 16 selected cities I use for my monthly verifications to my clients had the forecasted temp for January for the combination of all cities at 5.6 above normal. (The January run came off on the 21st.) Much better was its Jan. 10 forecast which they are using in the archives (good thing), but it was still a bit too warm across the north. But the point is it was out of control. The actual temp of all the cities to approximate the nation's temps: -.25! In fact only one major city in the sample, Seattle is as warm as the model says (plus 6.2) . Balancing that off is Orlando at -7. This is not as cold as December which was a bit over -3. But I showed that for you on the Long Ranger, how warm the climate model was for January.

Now lest you think I am picking on NOAA, let's go to the UKMET. There is no where in Europe it has below normal forecasted for January through March on its forecast. It is as bad there, as the CFS was with its nowcast. This is going to be a top 5 cold winter in eastern Europe, giving a different meaning to the cold war... because after this winter people will be at war with anyone shoving global warming down their throats. And one of the things I told Europeans in the prewinter period, and even said in on the Imus show here in the states, when this winter is done, no one is going to want to hear about this.

But is this on purpose? For instance the UKMET folks made a boast that 2010 would be the hottest on record. I responded by saying not unless someone is cooking the books. But there must be something they are trusting in their modeling to say that. (By the way, the Earth's temps can be seen in the objective satellite guidance found here: http://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/ courtesy of Dr. Roy Spencer

So here is my theory: 1) All climate models are essentially the same. Why? Well they each have their own way of development based on physics, but what happens is that the modelers watch the other models and adapt the strengths they see in the other models. Two models may be different at one time, in their early stages, but upgrades taking from other models essentially start to blend them all together. In the end, they all see about the same thing, because they have evolved through the years. This is Bill Gray's theory and I think he is right.

But point 2) is where I take over. The models have been developed in a period of warm PDO, then warm AMO with high solar constant. Such things can not be "modeled in". Instead the model is forced to react to something it cannot approximate and is forced to play catch up. When the atmosphere was warming in reaction to these un modeled driver, it probably had a cold bias. Modelers may have been forced to adjust to the this to improve the model skill scores. But they adjusted based on RESULTS, not the true CAUSES OF THE ERRORS!

Now what happens when we start taking away the drivers that may have been causing the warming. The PDO turns cold.. low solar constants have taken over, the AMO is going to turn cold in 10-15 years, and then the wild card is seismic activity which causes increased volcanism and may be a by-product of the low solar activity. Where do you think the bias will be? It's intuitive, it WOULD BE OPPOSITE.. A WARM BIAS!

Now, something I have been talking about in the debate, the lack of warming in the tropics and the drop in specific humidity, which is something that limits tropical activity, since drier air over the tropics means a storm has to "work" harder to develop.. as the pumping of moisture into the high levels would cool the air more than usual. It was part and parcel of why this was not a big year in the Atlantic, or anywhere, not the El Nino, as if it was El Nino driven, one would have seen a marked increase in the Pacific. But now we hear the global warming crowd saying, well it's drying a bit; that is why it's not warming. That it is drying in the stratosphere is even better (they haven't even acknowledged their bust in the troposphere over the tropics, the real smoking gun). It means the stratosphere is not cooling as they said it would (Dr. Tiffany Shaw has bravely gone where no one else would go on this, and pointed this out in her research!) And they cant explain it?

Sometimes I think they are blundering, and they don't even know it. Let's assume that was the answer; don't they understand that this means the CO2 argument is done?. You are admitting that there is something bigger that is in control, and it's not CO2. That others have known this before, is of course not mentioned, The think by saying that, they will be able to justify the cooling and then say CO2 will still be a problem. But how can it be the problem if you are telling us that water vapor increases or decreases are responsible (which is much more likely than CO2)? You can't have it both ways. So you have killed your own argument which is what others have done with the sunspot cycle. If they chuckle with glee if sunspots come roaring back to life because it means the Earth's temps may go up, then you are admitting that it's the sunspots are the drivers.

Now I will again state my position, so we understand. I think we are going to get our answer in the next 20-30 years, that these large-scale drivers that models can't handle and can only react to, not forecast, will have their day. If the Earth cools by objective satellite measurements, not NASA or Giss or NOAA or whoever playing around (the temps when we started measuring and the total sea ice when we started measuring in the late 1970s) then it's obvious I and many like me are right, that it is not a big deal. If it doesn't, then maybe CO2 would be a problem but many, many decades from now, especially in light of doubling CO2 could have a greater positive effect on food growth to feed people... something I think we are all in favor of. In the meantime, if it's going to get warm, these models can see it. If it's going to be cold, they are helpless.

I think I have a good argument as to why, if you simply follow the evidence.

Ciao for now.

THURSDAY NOON LONDON TIME

ACHTUNG! COLDEST JANUARY IN BERLIN SINCE THE 1980S.

Looks like the wall of warm has fallen in Berlin... and now this is getting out of control. The current reading there of 8.6F below normal makes it the coldest January since at least the 1980s.

And I don't see February much better.

Heck of a way to run a global meltdown.

Ciao for now. *****

WEDNESDAY NOON LONDON TIME

WINTER'S WORST HAS BEEN EAST AND SOUTH OF ENGLAND.

While I appreciate the enthusiasm folks have had for the cold of the winter, I am much more concerned with how the overall forecast has done. I was getting letters from folks in southeast Europe, and I had to remind them that the winter forecast was comparable to 2002-2003 with the core of the cold and that was to their north, just like it's to the southeast of England and east of France.

It has grown brutal in eastern Europe. Warsaw is within .2 of its temperature through this date in 2002-2003, Berlin is over 2F colder! In the west, it has been a colder winter overall... 2002-2003 on steroids is what this whole thing looks like, but when it is all said and done this would have been a cold winter for Europe from the Alps to the Ukraine and north, but the core was right where it was back in 2002-2003.

Thanks for reading. Ciao for now. ****

SUNDAY NOON LONDON TIME

Winter spreads back west.

If one looks at the London-Berlin example I was using as a contributor to the global temp challenge of Jan. 1-10, we find the idea of a return to normalcy posted here a couple of weeks ago was right. The first 15 days of the month ran 7.5 below normal, by far the most widespread cold in populated areas of northern Europe for this harsh part of winter since the 1980s. The last eight days have seen Berlin stay in the cold, and this is what I had said, the farther east you went, the more the cold would hold... they have been -6.5 SEVERE COLD is taking hold over Germany. However London is 1.6 above normal since Jan. 16.

The cold is getting ready to expand west again!

So folks in the battle of Britain and France that at least has allowed winter to let up a bit here (mind you the "thaw" is to around normal and part of the winter forecast... that cold centered over the east and maritime air masses would do battle) is going to come to a crashing end later this week. And while when it's all said and done the CORE OF COLD WILL BE WHERE IT WAS IN 2002-2003, it's simply that this winter is even colder than that one for the areas targeted.

Now you want to see a real thaw... and by the way winter is returning to the states also, look at the U.S. contributors to this: Chicago and NYC the first 15 days of the month...-3.9. Since then: PLUS 8.4 So they got a major break but winter is about to close in on them also.

So make sure the winter woolies are ready anew... it's coming later this week.

Ciao for now.

SATURDAY 2 A.M. LONDON TIME:

IN DEFENSE OF THE HADLEY CENTER

http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/01/climategate_cru_was_but_the_ti.html

NOAA may be the center of the storm!

Please read.

Ciao for now. ****

SATURDAY 2 P.M. LONDON TIME..

WINTER RETREATS EAST... FOR A WHILE.

The January thaw is here, and it will stay for a while. Now I don't know if you are hearing the same cries there that I hear from some sources in the states when we are in a thaw for the next 6-10 days before a harsh February descends, but there are folks saying.. "A-ha, see that? It's getting mild." The fact is the areas targeted for the cold winter in Europe and England and France were on the western side of this, have had the coldest start in over 20 years. That is the fact. It is not a mild winter, nor will it be a mild winter. The cold is retreating into its core area of our winter forecast and will reside there for 10-15 days. However, if one goes back and looks at the idea I had, including my critics, you will find that we expected the core of the cold to be to the east and east-southeast of England. So back-and-forth battles were going to occur between the air masses from the east and onslaught of maritime air, which of course brings more normal and even warmer-than-normal conditions, but winter is not over yet. The WORST is probably over in England and France, because the CORE of the worst is supposed to be to the east and southeast... back and forth means snow and cold but also that it can warm.

In the states, it's the opposite to some extent. The areas that are going to get hit worst when winter comes back are the East and South. So far, the winter there has spared the East a constant onslaught like you have just seen. The worst has been in the U.S. South where the ag industry has taken a beaten not seen in many years. The United States as a whole has had the coldest opening 45 days since the 1970s as their winter of 2000-2001 faded enough so that the onslaught that came after Jan. 1 this year has pushed it over the top. Just like in Europe, February will be the decider as to how bad this winter was against history. I feel with NOAA rewriting records from the 1960s and 1970s to it their agenda of trying to make things look warmer now, we can't trust any measurements unless they are purely satellite derived. A site that can show you this is here:

http://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/

This is how you should combat any nonsense that comes out. What should raise the eyebrows at the Hadley Center, and I am throwing you guys a bone to CONSIDER before you keep yelling about how warm it is, is that the peak of this nino seems to a) have been reached earlier than normal and b) did not reach the peak of 2006-2007, when it Jim Hansen who went nuts on hottest ever.

Now let's be fair. In the satellite era in spite of the leveling off the past 10 years, it is the warmest WE HAVE MEASURED WITH THESE METHODS. I am only arguing that you wait another 30 years, so we can see what happens after the Pacific is in its cold PDO for 30 years (it has recently reversed) and then the Atlantic goes. Let me help you out in the Met Centre with some good old fashioned American aid. You have to understand that the El Ninos are being preceded by cold PDOs now. It's not like the 1980s and 1990s guys (and gals) you were running the table with warm, warm, warm. Kick in the Atlantic switching to its warm cycle and what did you think would happen. Cmon now.. 75% of the world's surface is water... the ice caps are surrounded by water.... the two biggest oceans in their warm cycle together.. Folks, if you bet warming, you have a free shot on goal, NO GOALIE!

So let's be clear here... I don't believe I KNOW THE FUTURE, but I believe no man or no model knows it either. But you have to sit up and take notice as the why the reason you gave for it being warm is actually a reason why others in my field knew it would be cold! The El Nino is not like it was in the warm cycle years in the Pacific. In addition, you have some interesting problems going on in the Atlantic and I pointed that out earlier.. the Atlantic tripole was great for blocking! I posted in the rain in November telling you that RAIN AND WARM means it's going to get much colder, the trough was coming for winter! It's not whistling in the wind luck; it is a combination of respect and understanding of how the atmosphere works. I admit I had a HUGE advantage in my formative years, and in this field they started from when I was a lad, BECAUSE MY DAD IS A METEOROLOGIST who grew up in the last warm cycle and taught me how to create ideas without computers. HE HAD NO COMPUTERS.

Imagine, folks, we are 10 days before D-Day and we have 20 different models telling us 20 different things about the idea for D-day. I am assuming everyone remembers D-Day and how important the weather was.

So I am stating that winter is not over, but for England and France, the worst is, I am not saying that for NYC for instance. But it's because IT HAS BEEN SO BAD... how can it be worse? We still have cold and fun forecasts in front of us... but to get where we are going with the total the thaw had to come.

The value of this winter when we look at it will not be in arguing for the downfall of government weather. I don't advocate that in the least! I don't like the idea that taxpayer money funds operations that go beyond guidance into a field that competitive forecasters can beat each others brains out in, and hence come up with a product that will a) be have more value and b) attract greater attention as it's always fun to see who is saying what. As in most of the things I do, I am a safety net person. It is one of the reason I say without pause that my nation dumping $100 billion a year into fighting what may be a ghost, when we have problems in our face (for instance, how is it we are willing to spend that, yet our aid to Haiti is less than 1% of that.. I would much rather see, if we have that money, we help our homeless, clean up New Orleans and yes, dump more into Haiti. Besides, I believe earthquake activity is on the increase due to low total solar irradiance anyway, and we have a major earthquake zone in our lower Mississippi Valley that could come to life). You see what I am saying here. I hope the winter wakes people up to that.. fight what you see, not what you don't! You should be able to see that there are things going on that demand answers here, and I have the answer.. IN 20 TO 30 YEARS! CO2 at 420 ppm in 20 years is not going to "push us over the edge." If the Earth, as measured by objective, uncooked methods, cools and we see it's where it was in the late 1970s in 2025, then we know I am right (we don't know that now). So I hope the assault on salt (or as you call it grit) awakens you to that.

I read a passage from the author Og Mandino who said too many people are worried about solving the problems they see in others tomorrow without confronting their own shortcomings today. How true it is in the climate change battle... All worried about 10-20-30.... 300 years from now and we don't confront the problems today... If we did, perhaps this winter wouldn't be the big "surprise" to you, though as I am hearing, some that did not see it coming are saying it's no big deal.

After all, the hottest year on record after a top-five mild winter (I refuse to pile on about the barbecue summer.. it was a warm summer and between rainstorms, you could have gone out to barbecue, so stop whining (lol)) even though the winter is not turning out that way.. it has to be of more concern.

Keep an eye on the link above for the real global temp, okay!

Ciao for now. *****