The Return of El Nino

Some possible good news for our heating bills here in the great north woods is the return of El Nino in the Pacific. This means that warmer waters on the surface of the central Pacific will continue probably into next summer, and if it continues to strengthen it could mean record heat for many areas next summer. In the shorter term a moderate El Nino this winter usually brings warmer temperatures to the northern plains, including northern Minnesota. Now before you drag your beach umbrellas down to Park Point this January remember warmer is a relative term, and we will still get our share of sub-zero and snow. But overall it should be milder than the last two La Nina influenced winters.

In other climate news - global cooling is still not happening, at least according to statisticians who looked at the temperature data blindly. In a fine example of journalism an AP reporter sent the different datasets from land and satellite to several prominent statisticians without labeling the data and asked them to describe the trends. All of them said the trend is clearly upward and that any short-term downward trend is just random noise in the overall upward progression. There is a lot of disinformation out on the internet that uses cherry-picked statistics or records, but if you look at the data honestly the rapid rise in overall world temperature is obvious. If you don't believe me, take the GISS temp graph to a stockbroker and tell him it is a stock price graph - I bet you he will tell you to buy it.