Climate Letters

Dear Carl’s Climate Letters Readers:

After writing 2,168 letters beginning in late 2013, my dad, Carl Campbell, passed away on March 29th, 2022, in St. Louis, MO, at the age of 91 after a brief illness.

He began writing his climate letters when he was 81 years old and long retired from his career, an amazing feat that made his family and friends immensely proud. He considered his independent study of climate science and the posting of these letters to be the most fulfilling “job” of his life.

While studying daily weather maps and pondering issues such as anomalies in the polar regions, or the interconnection of precipitable water and greenhouse energy effects (from which he developed ‘Carl’s Theory’), my dad was constantly astonished at the rapidity of climate change.

One of his hopes was that someone, maybe a budding scientist, would carry on his research and explore new channels. But only time will tell.

On behalf of my dad, I want to thank you for your faithful readership regarding what he termed “the world’s number one concern.”

Lisa Campbell

campbell9lj@yahoo.com

Posted in Daily Climate Letters | Comments Off on Climate Letters

Climate Letter #2171

Here are today’s maps:

Lisa

Posted in Daily Climate Letters | Comments Off on Climate Letter #2171

Climate Letter #2170

Here are today’s maps:

Lisa

Posted in Daily Climate Letters | Comments Off on Climate Letter #2170

Climate Letter #2169

Here are today’s weather maps:

Lisa

Posted in Daily Climate Letters | Comments Off on Climate Letter #2169

Climate Letter #2168

Here are today’s maps:

Lisa

Posted in Daily Climate Letters | Comments Off on Climate Letter #2168

Climate Letter #2167

This is Lisa Campbell, I’ll be posting daily charts for the next few days while my dad is on a short hiatus.

Posted in Daily Climate Letters | Comments Off on Climate Letter #2167

Climate Letter #2166

The study discussed in yesterday’s letter provided substantial science-based evidence that a super-abundance of water vapor, forming sporadically in the atmosphere at a very high altitude, generates its own amount of greenhouse energy to the surface below—as an addition to what would normally be there. The vapor that forms is of unlimited quantity, having nothing to do with the CO2 level or the Clausius/Clapeyron equation. These very same principles appear in my work, except on a smaller scale, and with no need for extraordinary circumstances. They have everyday application. I recommend the study to anyone who might be curious about such things.

Carl

Posted in Daily Climate Letters | Comments Off on Climate Letter #2166

Climate Letter #2165

I will mainly be showing maps and not writing much again today.  However, there is something else that I highly recommend for your reading, a fascinating article about the Columbia River basalt eruptions, recently published in Geophysical Research Letters.  Results of the study that was conducted are related to the work I have been presenting about the greenhouse energy effect of precipitable water (in this case just the vapor) when it frequently infuses the upper part of the atmosphere:  https://eos.org/articles/the-surprising-greenhouse-gas-that-caused-volcanic-summer.  The findings are preliminary and still needs to be expanded.  They have received almost no attention to date apart from some words of encouragement from outsiders.  I am impressed by the resume and previous work of the lead author—https://science.gsfc.nasa.gov/sed/bio/scott.d.guzewich.  This is the link to the full study:  https://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2022/pdf/2070.pdf.

Today’s maps show that PW penetration of the Arctic region still faces difficulties, leaving the overall anomaly well below its trendline:

Carl

Posted in Daily Climate Letters | Comments Off on Climate Letter #2165

Climate Letter #2164

I’ll start today with one more look, on today’s map, at high-altitude air pressure over Antarctica. This nice compact shape of the blue zone, with no irregularities on the border, is what we have come to expect for this region. The cavity that recently developed (see CL#2158 on Mar 15), causing a spectacular temperature anomaly, can be thought of as shocking, or at least exciting, or purely an aberration with no lasting effect:

The blue zone in the Arctic, and surrounding green zone as well, is an entirely different matter. Irregularities come and go practically every day. Today is typical for both blue and green zones. The big cavity we saw yesterday that resembled the one in Antarctica and seemed ready to expand has instead tightened up a bit. Sea level pressure may have helped by pulling back instead of expanding outward. The overall anomaly picture–netting warm ones and cold—has changed very little, and so also the relatively low number (+0.7C on the next map) for the Arctic region:

Here are the other maps. I will probably be showing sea level pressure maps more often because the changes recorded do seem to have an important influence on the daily outcome for the high-level configuration, which in turn sets off other critical high-level changes that ultimately affect anomaly production in significant ways.

Carl

Posted in Daily Climate Letters | Comments Off on Climate Letter #2164

Climate Letter #2163

I’m Lisa Campbell. My dad needs to take the day off today due to some medical issues. He still wants to publish a record every day of key climate maps that illustrate much of the story about how the Arctic is warming. He has one comment today, involving sea level pressure:

On the high-altitude air pressure map, third from the top, observe the large cavity that is forming in the upper left.  It reminds one of a similar cavity that formed in Antarctica a week ago.  This one is already admitting the penetration of a looping jet stream that is transporting an atmospheric river of medium size. The precipitable water content is having a noticeable impact on temperatures. High sea level pressure may be active in wedging the cavity open.  We’ll see how all of this develops tomorrow.

Carl

Posted in Daily Climate Letters | Comments Off on Climate Letter #2163