Climate science
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If you have been following climate news, you know that NOAA will be updating their 30-year normals for temperature, precipitation, and degree days this year, most likely in May when they finish collecting and quality controlling the data they use to compute the new 1991-2020 statistics. This week NOAA released some more information about what…
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With short days and lots of cloudy days, winter is the time of year when we are most likely to see Seasonal Affective Disorder, or SAD. With cloud cover over the Southeast this week, it could be a big factor in your bad mood. For Alabama and the western half of Georgia, January or February…
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A new study in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences was published on Monday. The researchers in the study found a strong link between planetary warming and pollen seasons. That could mean more misery for allergy-sufferers in the years ahead. The study shows that the combination of warmer air plus more carbon dioxide…
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Here is an interesting article on snowflakes from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In it, my friend and fellow climatologist Dr. Chip Konrad discusses the science of how snowflakes are formed. And then Michael Chitwood, Carolina professor and poet, explores the lyrical wonder of snowflakes. Together they create a beautiful picture of…
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Some of you may know that normal temperatures are averages calculated over a 30-year period. The current “normal” period is 1981-2010, but that is due to change later this year when the climate records for 2020 are finalized after quality control and the new averages are calculated by NOAA. The new normals should be released…
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New research published in the journal Science shows that in recent years, hurricanes are strengthening closer to land now than in the 1980s when their data set began. They are also forming farther north and west than they used to, possibly due to the expansion of the tropics under a warmer climate, although it could…
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As someone who grew up in Michigan and Wisconsin, I saw plenty of evidence of Earth’s ice ages written in the terrain all around me. There were plenty of moraines and kettle lakes and outwash plains, and I even got to drive through the Driftless Area of SW Wisconsin on occasion when I was traveling…