Climate Letter #1409

Following up on what was said in Friday.s letter, and the new change of emphasis, there is a fine illustration this morning of the kind of thing I look for when checking out “Today’s Weather Maps” on the Climate Reanalyzer website.  If you are reading this today, you can go right to the website—https://climatereanalyzer.org/wx/DailySummary/#t2—otherwise, I have posted each special image separately for later viewing with preservation, the first of which for today looks like this:  https://climatereanalyzer.org/wx_frames/gfs/ds/gfs_nh-sat1_t2_1-day.png

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What quickly caught my eye this morning was an unusual intrusion of red running from Texas up to Wisconsin, implying extra high temperatures for that  central US region.  Now click on the the Temperature Anomaly link for a comparison (or, later on, hit https://climatereanalyzer.org/wx_frames/gfs/ds/gfs_nh-sat1_t2anom_1-day.png)  The brownish- colored overlay makes a reasonably good fit for the region we first saw in red.  (You will need to bear in mind that all of these one-day images reflect events that tend to move around somewhat almost all the time, and the timing behind their recording instruments is generally not synchronized to perfection.)  For one particular example of an anomaly, note how southern Wisconsin has warmed enough to bring its daily average to about 10C (or 18F) above normal, a pretty good jump.
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Now click on Precipitable Water (or hit https://climatereanalyzer.org/wx_frames/gfs/ds/gfs_nh-sat1_pwtr_1-day.png) and see how this situation starts to get more interesting.  It’s easy to trace a movement of exceptionally strong PWAT from its likely place of origin in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico through Texas and up to Wisconsin, simply by following the blue streak with dark brown edging. In Wisconsin you can use the nearby color code to interpret a top reading of about 30kg for the measured weight of all the water in a column of one square meter of air from ground level to the top of the atmosphere. That is a little more than double what the reading of around 13 kg would normally be in that location.  The  observed temperature gain of about 10C associated with that amount of increase in PWAT concentration is not unusual—more on that point forthcoming.
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Next, one might like to know why that particular stream of PWAT happened to make that particular journey.  Was there an outside influence?  For example, could a piece of jetstream have made a difference?  Let’s try clicking on that link (or hit https://climatereanalyzer.org/wx_frames/gfs/ds/gfs_nh-sat1_ws250-snowc-topo_1-day.png)  The wind in jetstream segments generally wants to flow in an easterly direction, even when it is making loops.  I don’t think the jetstream could have had any influence on PWAT on this occasion.  So what about surface winds?  We can check out that possibility just as easily on the Wind Speed link (or https://climatereanalyzer.org/wx_frames/gfs/ds/gfs_nh-sat1_ws10_1-day.png)  Aha, a perfect fit, one that seems to explain everything.  Fast-moving wind across the Gulf first helped to increase its evaporation rate, then served as a carrier for all that extra moisture through Texas and continuing up to Wisconsin, and beyond, in an almost perfect geographical match for the PWAT imagery we saw before.
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Was there any rainfall associated with this movement?  Try the Precipitation link (or https://climatereanalyzer.org/wx_frames/gfs/ds/gfs_nh-sat1_prcp-tcld-topo_1-day.png)  There is obviously a great deal of rain in the northern part of the stream, though not everywhere along the way, which is usually how it goes.
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There is one special thing about all this that must not be overlooked.  Precipitable water is formed as pure water vapor, from evaporation, and from that point forward remains almost entirely composed of water vapor—some say 99%–as it spreads through the atmosphere.  Water droplets and icy particles, while having perhaps the greatest share of interest, are just a tiny part.  The main point I want to stress is this: wherever there are elevated amounts of PWAT in place there are equally elevated amounts of water vapor and its powerful greenhouse gas effect, along with the elevated chances of precipitation that are of so much interest to meteorologists.  The two phenomena are at all times joined at the hip.
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Finally, what we have seen today is a real-life example of the power of water vapor as a greenhouse gas.  It is consistent with what I have observed over and over again when studying these maps.  What I have come to believe is that any time the concentration of water vapor (as PWAT) in a particular region is doubled, anywhere and from any level, there is potential for an immediate increase in temperature for that region in the neighborhood of 8 degrees C.  That is a high number, and the implications are considerable.
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Just one web story today—what scientists are saying about climate feedback loops that is worrisome:

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