Tonga volcano eruption last winter (Northern Hemisphere) threw a huge amount of water incredibly high into the atmosphere. The density of water vapor in the stratosphere increased by 10%. This should cause greater reflection of solar rays; although, water vapor below the stratosphere has heat trapping qualities. Once water vapor gets up there (well above the weather) it seems to take a very long time to dissipate. I know that through July and August there was an undulating band of water between 30 and 60 degrees Latitude South circling the entire planet that was literally 10-15 degrees Celsius below the seasonal average.

My guess all year has been that the wacky weather all over the world is largely being driven by the Tonga eruption. The people who study this sort of stuff seemed very excited in the early Spring to be able to watch the global impulse response because this was an unprecedented event in the era since we have had instruments to observe it.

The eruption was on the higher end in terms of strength and was positioned almost perfectly under the water to displace water vapor. Had it been just a little bit deeper and the energy would have been displaced to not get water vapor through the stratopause, so water displacement was kind of maximized.

The sulfur ash thrown up by Mt. Pinatubo in the early 1990s lowered global temperatures by almost a full degree Celsius for the better part of a decade. The associated sulfur this time does seem to have remained entirely over the Southern Hemisphere at least through April or May. So there is Australia's super winter a few months back. The temperature deviations in Southern Australia were much less severe than the temperature variations in the waters a few thousand miles further South.

Really warm in Austria too. 20 Celsius in November is like 10 degrees too much.

(20 * 9 / 5) + 32
carry the one
68

gopher: vDip's resident Celsius to Fahrenheit calculator on demand :D

By the way GOD, y'all over in Europe are sucking massive amounts of diesel out of the continental US. Diesel prices are spiraling up in the States to levels that are generating public anxieties, especially in the Mid-Atlantic States and New England. This is with basically every US refinery running at over 95% capacity. One industrial accident or serious maintenance issue is going to send US diesel prices to the moon and force serious political discussion of export restrictions.

So be very thankful you are having an extremely warm winter.

There is a Senate election in New Hampshire that was expected to be a blow out for the incumbent Democrat and now appears inexplicably close. Supposedly, the driver has been the first round of homeowners buying their heating oil (basically diesel) for the winter and having heart attacks over the prices.

godless, commie, Francofied metric temperature to Fahrenheit.

Gopher, your messages are 'interesting' but why do you publish a thesis on every thread? No offence intended but you got 2 posts in and started talking about elections in New Hampshire.

It was really a post about historically warm weather in Europe.

Ok, I was just confused.

Fascinating stuff gopher. Do you have any further reading for interested parties?

You could Google Javier Blas, who writes for Bloomberg. He has certainly been covering this stuff extensively. The problem is that much of his work is behind a paywall.

And right on cue, there has been a fire at a refinery in Corpus Christi, Texas resulting in a shutdown. Running these sorts of incredibly complex industrial-scale chemical facilities flat out at 95+% capacity for months on end with no down time for basic maintenance kind of inevitably leads to accidents somewhere. Nearly every refinery in America has been running at close to maximum capacity at least since the Russian invasion to make up for gaps left by disruptions to Russian refining capacity. The world has lost around 4% of its refining capacity for various reasons since the pandemic started.

It is only a partial shutdown and hopefully there won't be in real damage, but these facilities take time to turn on and off, plus there will presumably need to be a round of extensive regulatory inspections.

Magically, it is cold now.

And downunder too... everything's gone wrong :(

I hope that folks aren't confusing the effects of this eruption with climate change. The weird weather is overwhelmingly our fault, not a volcano's. Here's an explainer (in Spanish, but I'm sure that you can translate or find others):
https://www.rtve.es/noticias/20221109/explicamos-posible-efectp-hunga-tonga-cambio-climatico/2408427.shtml

The Tonga eruption happened earlier this year. Yet as announced on Sunday: "The past eight years are on track to be the eight warmest on record, fuelled by ever-rising greenhouse gas concentrations and accumulated heat."
https://public.wmo.int/en/media/press-release/eight-warmest-years-record-witness-upsurge-climate-change-impacts

"Weather" and "climate" are different things. The floods and droughts this year that are 7 and 8 sigma events seem likely to be driven by the eruption much as very large volcanic eruptions have historically caused weird weather. Droughts have occurred this year in places that the climate models generally predict should see wetter weather. Much of the Southern Hemisphere seems exceptionally cool at the moment. Hence the difference between weather in this moment and climate over longer time horizons.

Also, refinery fire this morning in El Segundo, California. Luckily, California regulates to use a bespoke formulation of gasoline, so presumably little of this production leaves the state. Any shutdown may only cause acute local shortages without either reducing exports or sucking in outside supply.