German Climate Institutes Revise: CO2 Will Now Cause Warmer Winters With “More Frequent Cold”

German online news weekly FOCUS here has a report on the impacts of climate change on European winters, particularly those in Germany.

Dubious science: German scientists claim warming Arctic leads to a colder and warmer Northern hemisphere. Photo source: NASA, public domain.

A few years back we all heard scientists saying that snow and cold winters were a thing of the past in Europe. But now that we’ve had several successive snowy and cold winters in a row, they’ve backpedalled and are now claiming global warming leads to more (and not less) cold and snowy winters instead. And not just in Europe, but also over the Northern Hemisphere as a whole.

According to FOCUS, Germany’s leading climate institutes are now saying we will be getting both warmer and colder at the same time. How that can physically happen they have yet to figure out. Just believe their models, I guess.

FOCUS reports that “in Central Europe, cold icy winters will probably prevail instead of Mediterranean-like climate, and that in the future snow will fall from the skies more often.”

Ralf Jaiser of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Ocean Research says:

The possibility exists even if more or less certain prognoses are impossible.”

The scientists are blaming global warming and the melting Arctic for the projected colder European winters.

FOCUS also quotes the Max Planck Institute: “Model simulations and observation data both show that the retreat in sea ice also changes the weather system,” says Dirk Notz of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg. He says this will cause “cold polar air to stream down into Europe”. That means two of Germany’s renowned climate institutes are now claiming global warming means colder European winters.

But Rahmstorf says we will get warmer winters with more frequent cold.

FOCUS also quotes Stefan Rahmstorf of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, who says the recent Greenland high that forced hurricane Sandy into America’s east coast and a cold snap to grip Europe at the same time “could be a consequence of the ice melt in the Arctic”. “Both the models simulations and measured data indicate a relationship between sea ice retreat and more frequent highs over Greenland.“

He’s so full of it.

Dirk Notz also says a warming Arctic also means a smaller temperature differences with respect to southern regions and that the jet stream is thus weakening, which in turn leads to easier mixing of air masses. So far this year there have been two studies showing Arctic sea ice melt may lead to heavier snowfalls in the northern hemisphere. Notz says that there is a greater probability of cold winters ahead.

But Rahmstorf disputes that. Focus quotes Rahmstorf:

Stefan Rahmstorf of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact research assumes to the contrary that the average winter temperatures will continue to rise. ‘Merely temporary cold snaps like during last February which led to record cold in all of Europe may increase.'”

They want their cake and to eat it, too. What’s strange in all this is that if polar air streams down southwards, then something has to move up to replace it. That would would mean southern air streaming up into the Arctic. Thus we would have to say that the Arctic melt is caused by changing wind patterns and not by warming. It seems the German alarmists are trying to get everything their way, but it’s physically impossible.

They’re weaving a very confused web.

 

7 responses to “German Climate Institutes Revise: CO2 Will Now Cause Warmer Winters With “More Frequent Cold””

  1. Bernd Felsche

    “They’re weaving a very confused web.”

    In which they will become entangled.

  2. Juraj V.

    Looks like someone just discovered an Artic oscillation.

    One more thing: AGW is allegedly caused by increase in IR downward radiation, however, no one ever observes or measures it. It is always masked as: more frequent El Nino, warmer ocean currents, position of atmospheric heights, cold snaps, less clouds.. but never the radiation itself. Weird.. 😉

    1. DirkH

      Well. A doubling should by their writings lead to an increase of 5.4 W/m^2; but we only have 40% increase so far, so probably only 2 W/m^2 by now.

      How would you measure that – average Wattage of IR is 180 W/m^2 or so… how would you find out that 2 W of those are anthropogenic? The daily fluctuation is far bigger than the expected effect…

      which would any sane person lead to dismissing the entire edifice immediately, as obvious nonsense.

  3. Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup | Watts Up With That?
  4. Brian H

    Dirk;
    To be fair, consider a situation where daily temperature variation was between 10°C and 20°C. Then, over some years, this became 12°C to 22°C. It would be fair to conclude there had been a 2K rise in the average (assuming similar daily patterns overall).

    But in any case, only ground DIR measurements with chilled instruments, as with satellite IR telescopes, mean anything. Ambient temp instruments just measure themselves.

    1. DirkH

      A rise in temperatures can be caused by anything.
      IR absorption and re-radiation is a fast process.
      It should have effects within seconds or minutes.
      Here’s somebody who tried to find the supposed fast effects:
      “A clear prediction of the CO2AGW theory is that positive water vapor feedback should occur AND that the radiating top layer of the troposphere that radiates most of the IR to space should rise.
      Both predictions can be tested, have been tested, and fail:
      http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/simple-disproof-of-runaway-greenhouse.html
      http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2012/03/simple-disproof-of-runaway-greenhouse.html?showComment=1332558067400#c2031512486689428024
      It is now time for the CO2AGW scientists to accept this failure, come up with a new theory, and make new predictions.

  5. Doug Proctor

    For a settled science and certain outcome, we sure are getting a varying causitive chain and resultant weather pattern … from the same people!

    The stock market is going up, the stock market is coming down, the stock market is in neutral. Money and weather, the two most important influences in our lives, and either one can respond positively, negatively or neutrally to the same stimulus.

    When will Forbes and Bloomberg lose patience? That’s the key. Gore and Suzuki and Hansen are stuck looking like ranting priests of the apocalpyse. We don’t really care. Business leaders though, that’s more awkward, ’cause we might give our money to others if they are too weirdly out-of-touch on CAGW.

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