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Less hot grades and thick snow sledding.
Global warming can lead to more severe winters, with us.
“Severe winter weather is much more common when the Arctic is at its warmest,” climate researcher Judah Cohen told the New York Times.
A rare and severe winter cold has gripped Sweden and northern Europe. Like much of North America.
Cold air in the Arctic is normally held in place by air currents high above the ground, which is generally called a polar vortex.
When hot air currents penetrate, the polar vortex can rupture, a phenomenon called sudden stratospheric heating. The icy polar air near the ground is then pushed south.
For us.
Photo: SMHI
Erik Kjellström, SMHI Professor of Climatology.
In the images, the warm air currents look like a red blob that has taken over the entire Arctic.
It’s cold air
– It is a meteorological phenomenon that occurs from time to time and causes severe eruptions of cold air on the continent. It can last anywhere from a few days to weeks, says Erik Kjellström, a professor of climatology at SMHI.
There is an agreement in science that climate change provides a warmer climate. Heating is also faster in the Arctic.
Therefore, a question that involves the research world is whether this type of disturbance will become more common in the future, when the Arctic warms.
More snowstorms
A study in the journal Nature was able to establish last year that snow storms in the northeastern United States increased significantly between 2008 and 2018.
“Severe winter weather is much more common when the Arctic is at its warmest,” climate researcher Judah Cohen, who led the study, told the New York Times.
The winters of the future can be very mild or cold and snowy, he says.
“The motto of snowstorms in times of climate change can be ‘go big or go home,'” Judah Cohen told the New York Times.
An earlier study has also pointed to the connection between heat in the Arctic and cold in North America.
“Image not ready”
Erik Kjellström of SMHI believes that some point out that large snowfalls may become even heavier in the future, as a result of the air containing more water vapor when it is hotter.
At the same time, he believes that it is too early to draw conclusions about what the winters of the future will be like, after climate change.
– The investigation that has been carried out gives partly contradictory signals. The photo is not clear. This is one of the big questions for the future, he says. If the frequency of different types of weather changes, this would have important consequences for us.
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