This blog post and the “Deep Dive” podcast, created by NotebookLM, are based on “Energy‐Consumption‐Induced Anthropogenic Heat Release Intensifies Heatwaves and Wildfire Threats in North America: A CESM2‐Based Projection for the Late 21st Century” by Wang et al. (2025). When we talk about climate change, the conversation almost invariably turns to greenhouse gases. Carbon dioxide,... Continue Reading →
This blog post and the “Deep Dive” podcast, created by NotebookLM, are based on “Combined impacts of hurricane strengthening and global mean sea level rise on future Atlantic storm surge events” by Danso et al. (2025). It’s a scenario that seems frighteningly straightforward: as climate change causes sea levels to rise and hurricanes to strengthen,... Continue Reading →
Seasonal hurricane outlooks, such as those issued by NOAA's Climate Prediction Center, Colorado State University (Klotzbach et al., 2017), European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, and University of Arizona (Davis and Zeng, 2019), produce skillful (i.e.,. better than climatology) seasonal forecasts of overall North Atlantic tropical cyclone (TC) activity. Such forecasts are possible because seasonal... Continue Reading →
The southwestern United States (US) and Northern Mexico experienced their longest stretch of record-breaking heat wave in the summer of 2023 from mid-June to early August, affecting over 100 million people, causing over 200 deaths, and $14.5 billion in economic loss. In Phoenix, Arizona, for example, the heat wave lasted for 31 days from 30... Continue Reading →
Atlantic Niña is a natural climate pattern characterized by cooler-than-average sea surface temperatures in the eastern equatorial Atlantic Ocean, appearing predominantly in June-August. It is considered the 'cold phase' of the Atlantic Zonal Mode, the leading mode of tropical Atlantic sea surface temperature variability in June-August, similar to how La Niña is the cold phase... Continue Reading →
Atlantic Niña is a natural climate pattern characterized by cooler-than-average sea surface temperatures in the eastern equatorial Atlantic Ocean. It’s considered the 'cold phase' of what oceanographers call the Atlantic Zonal Mode, similar to how La Niña is the cold phase of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) in the Pacific. Looking at the latest NOAA... Continue Reading →
Tropical cyclone (TC) activity results in substantial loss of life and property damage. While the Atlantic basin has experienced a pronounced increase in accumulated cyclone energy (ACE) and the number of TCs over the past 50 years, TC-resolving climate models project a slight decrease in TC frequency throughout the 21st century (e.g., Roberts et al.,... Continue Reading →
Currently (as of June 22, 2024), a phenomenon known as Atlantic Niña is brewing in the tropical Atlantic Ocean. As the Atlantic counterpart of La Niña in the Pacific, Atlantic Niña is characterized by the appearance of cold sea surface temperature anomalies (SSTAs) in the eastern equatorial Atlantic. It is known to reduce rainfall and... Continue Reading →
On December 10, 2021, one of the most destructive winter tornado outbreaks developed in northeastern Arkansas. This tornado outbreak, later coined as the Quad-State Tornado Outbreaks by the news media, struck portions of the Ohio Valley, including Missouri, Illinois, Tennessee, and Kentucky, from December 10 to 11, 2021. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric... Continue Reading →
Atlantic Niño is the Atlantic counterpart of El Niño in the Pacific, often referred to as El Niño's little brother. It was previously thought to have only regional influence on rainfall variability in West Africa, but a growing number of studies have shown that Atlantic Niño also plays an important role in the development of... Continue Reading →
Ocean to Climate 