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The Gore effect or Al Gore effect refers to coincidence between occurrences of unseasonably cold weather and some events associated with global warming activism, particularly those attended by former Vice President of the United States and Nobel Peace Prize recipient Al Gore, which was created and "amusedly" used by global warming deniers. [1]
Citing the crowdsourced Urban Dictionary , Peter Scowan of The Globe and Mail reported the term as "the phenomenon that leads to unseasonably cold temperatures, driving rain, hail, or snow whenever Al Gore visits an area to discuss global warming". [2] Erika Lovely of Politico described it as occurring when "a global warming-related event, or appearance by...Al Gore, is marked by exceedingly cold weather or unseasonably winter weather". [1] The phenomenon was reportedly first observed in January 2004 when a speech by Gore to a global warming rally held in New York City met extremely cold winter weather; [3] according to Andrew Bolt after another Gore speech took place on a strikingly cold day in Boston in the same year. [4] "Climate skeptics" use the term "half-seriously" in relation to the weather conditions at global warming venues. [1] German authors Daniel Rettig and Jochen Mai described the effect in 2012 in a popular science book about psychological mechanisms and memes, but referred to it as selective perception. [5] CNN meteorologist Rob Marciano describes use of the effect as a mere in-joke among weather forecasters: "in the weather community, we kind of joke about it. It's just a bad timing. Every time there's some big weather climate conference, there seems to be a cold outbreak. ... But, globally, we are still warming." [6]
Curtis Brainard of the Columbia Journalism Review has called coverage of the Gore effect "asinine", noting the distinction between short-term weather and long-term climate, [7] while Steve Benen of the Washington Monthly called focus on the claim "insulting". [8] Michael Daly criticized "delight in noting coincidences between events relating to [Gore's] favorite subject and severe winter weather." [9] Environmentalist A. Siegel has called the jokes a "shallow observation" from "those who don't get that weather isn't climate". [10] Phenomena attributed to the Gore effect are "chalked up as coincidence", according to Joe Joyce, a weather forecaster and environmental reporter. [11] Media Matters for America quoted Patrick J. Michaels, a climate change denying climatologist and commentator with the libertarian Cato Institute in Washington with the observation that "the predictable distortion of extreme weather goes in both directions". [12] Kalee Kreider, a spokesperson for Gore, told Erika Lovely: "As amusing as this little study sounds, we don’t think it should distract us from the reality." [1]
Winter is the coldest and darkest season of the year in polar and temperate climates. It occurs after autumn and before spring. The tilt of Earth's axis causes seasons; winter occurs when a hemisphere is oriented away from the Sun. Different cultures define different dates as the start of winter, and some use a definition based on weather.
Lake-effect snow is produced during cooler atmospheric conditions when a cold air mass moves across long expanses of warmer lake water. The lower layer of air, heated by the lake water, picks up water vapor from the lake and rises through colder air. The vapor then freezes and is deposited on the leeward (downwind) shores.
Fog is a visible aerosol consisting of tiny water droplets or ice crystals suspended in the air at or near the Earth's surface. Fog can be considered a type of low-lying cloud usually resembling stratus, and is heavily influenced by nearby bodies of water, topography, and wind conditions. In turn, fog affects many human activities, such as shipping, travel, and warfare.
In meteorology, precipitation is any product of the condensation of atmospheric water vapor that falls from clouds due to gravitational pull. The main forms of precipitation include drizzle, rain, sleet, snow, ice pellets, graupel and hail. Precipitation occurs when a portion of the atmosphere becomes saturated with water vapor, so that the water condenses and "precipitates" or falls. Thus, fog and mist are not precipitation; their water vapor does not condense sufficiently to precipitate, so fog and mist do not fall. Two processes, possibly acting together, can lead to air becoming saturated with water vapor: cooling the air or adding water vapor to the air. Precipitation forms as smaller droplets coalesce via collision with other rain drops or ice crystals within a cloud. Short, intense periods of rain in scattered locations are called showers.
The North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) is a weather phenomenon over the North Atlantic Ocean of fluctuations in the difference of atmospheric pressure at sea level (SLP) between the Icelandic Low and the Azores High. Through fluctuations in the strength of the Icelandic Low and the Azores High, it controls the strength and direction of westerly winds and location of storm tracks across the North Atlantic.
The Snowbelt, Snow Belt, Frostbelt, or Frost Belt is the region near the Great Lakes in North America where heavy snowfall in the form of lake-effect snow is particularly common. Snowbelts are typically found downwind of the lakes, principally off the eastern and southern shores.
The Arctic oscillation (AO) or Northern Annular Mode/Northern Hemisphere Annular Mode (NAM) is a weather phenomenon at the Arctic pole north of 55 degrees latitude. It is an important mode of climate variability for the Northern Hemisphere. The southern hemisphere analogue is called the Antarctic oscillation or Southern Annular Mode (SAM). The index varies over time with no particular periodicity, and is characterized by non-seasonal sea-level pressure anomalies of one sign in the Arctic, balanced by anomalies of opposite sign centered at about 37–45° N.
The climate of Chicago is classified as hot-summer humid continental with hot humid summers and cold, occasionally snowy winters. All four seasons are distinctly represented: Winters are cold and often see snow with below 0 Celsius temperatures and windchills, while summers are warm and humid with temperatures being hotter inland, spring and fall bring bouts of both cool and warm weather and fairly sunny skies. Annual precipitation in Chicago is moderate and relatively evenly distributed, the driest months being January and February and the wettest July and August. Chicago's weather is influenced during all four seasons by the nearby presence of Lake Michigan.
Joe Bastardi is a professional meteorologist and weather forecaster. He is a frequent guest on TV news shows. Bastardi is an outspoken denier of human-induced global warming whose public statements frequently contradict the scientific consensus on climate change.
An Inconvenient Truth is a 2006 American documentary film directed by Davis Guggenheim about former vice president of the United States Al Gore's campaign to educate people about global warming. The film features a slide show that, by Gore's own estimate, he has presented over 1,000 times to audiences worldwide.
A cold wave is a weather phenomenon that is distinguished by a cooling of the air. Specifically, as used by the U.S. National Weather Service, a cold wave is a rapid fall in temperature within a 24-hour period requiring substantially increased protection to agriculture, industry, commerce, and social activities. The precise criteria for a cold wave are the rate at which the temperature falls, and the minimum to which it falls. This minimum temperature is dependent on the geographical region and time of year.
Minnesota has a humid continental climate, with hot summers and cold winters. Minnesota's location in the Upper Midwest allows it to experience some of the widest variety of weather in the United States, with each of the four seasons having its own distinct characteristics. The area near Lake Superior in the Minnesota Arrowhead region experiences weather unique from the rest of the state. The moderating effect of Lake Superior keeps the surrounding area relatively cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter, giving that region a smaller yearly temperature variation. On the Köppen climate classification, much of the southern third of Minnesota—roughly from the Twin Cities region southward—falls in the hot summer zone (Dfa), and the northern two-thirds of Minnesota falls in the warm summer zone (Dfb).
The characteristics of United States rainfall climatology differ significantly across the United States and those under United States sovereignty. Summer and early fall bring brief, but frequent thundershowers and tropical cyclones which create a wet summer and drier winter in the eastern Gulf and lower East Coast. During the winter, and spring, Pacific storm systems bring Hawaii and the western United States most of their precipitation. Low pressure systems moving up the East Coast and through the Great Lakes, bring cold season precipitation to from the Midwest to New England, as well as Great Salt Lake. The snow to liquid ratio across the contiguous United States averages 13:1, meaning 13 inches (330 mm) of snow melts down to 1 inch (25 mm) of water.
Polar amplification is the phenomenon that any change in the net radiation balance tends to produce a larger change in temperature near the poles than in the planetary average. This is commonly referred to as the ratio of polar warming to tropical warming. On a planet with an atmosphere that can restrict emission of longwave radiation to space, surface temperatures will be warmer than a simple planetary equilibrium temperature calculation would predict. Where the atmosphere or an extensive ocean is able to transport heat polewards, the poles will be warmer and equatorial regions cooler than their local net radiation balances would predict. The poles will experience the most cooling when the global-mean temperature is lower relative to a reference climate; alternatively, the poles will experience the greatest warming when the global-mean temperature is higher.
The climate of South Africa is determined by South Africa's situation between 22°S and 35°S, in the Southern Hemisphere's subtropical zone, and its location between two oceans, Atlantic and the Indian.
In phenology, season creep refers to observed changes in the timing of the seasons, such as earlier indications of spring widely observed in temperate areas across the Northern Hemisphere. Phenological records analyzed by climate scientists have shown significant temporal trends in the observed time of seasonal events, from the end of the 20th century and continuing into the 21st century. In Europe, season creep has been associated with the arrival of spring moving up by approximately one week in a recent 30-year period. Other studies have put the rate of season creep measured by plant phenology in the range of 2–3 days per decade advancement in spring, and 0.3–1.6 days per decade delay in autumn, over the past 30–80 years.
Al Gore is an American politician and environmentalist. He was vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001, the Democratic Party's presidential nominee in 2000, and the co-recipient of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. He has been involved with the environmental activist movement for a number of decades and has had full participation since he left the vice-presidency in 2001.
Svalbard is a Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic Ocean. The climate of Svalbard is principally a result of its latitude, which is between 74° and 81° north. Climate is defined by the World Meteorological Organization as the average weather over a 30-year period. The North Atlantic Current moderates Svalbard's temperatures, particularly during winter, giving it up to 20 °C (36 °F) higher winter temperature than similar latitudes in continental Russia and Canada. This keeps the surrounding waters open and navigable most of the year. The interior fjord areas and valleys, sheltered by the mountains, have fewer temperature differences than the coast, with about 2 °C lower summer temperatures and 3 °C higher winter temperatures. On the south of the largest island, Spitsbergen, the temperature is slightly higher than further north and west. During winter, the temperature difference between south and north is typically 5 °C, and about 3 °C in summer. Bear Island (Bjørnøya) has average temperatures even higher than the rest of the archipelago.
An ice cap climate is a polar climate where no mean monthly temperature exceeds 0 °C (32 °F). The climate generally covers areas at high altitudes and polar regions, such as Antarctica and some of the northernmost islands of Canada and Russia. Most of Greenland is under the influence of an ice cap climate, although the coasts are prone to more influence from the sea, providing more tundra climates. Some regions on the islands of Norway's Svalbard Archipelago facilitate an ice cap climate. Areas with ice cap climates are normally covered by a permanent layer of ice and have no vegetation. There is limited animal life in most ice cap climates, which are usually found near the oceanic margins. Although ice cap climates are inhospitable to human life and no civilian communities lie in such climates, there are some research stations scattered in Antarctica and interior Greenland.
The January–March 2014 North American cold wave was an extreme weather event that extended through the late winter months of the 2013–2014 winter season, and was also part of an unusually cold winter affecting parts of Canada and parts of the north-central and northeastern United States. The event occurred in early 2014 and was caused by a southward shift of the North Polar Vortex. Record-low temperatures also extended well into March.
For several years now, skeptics have amusedly eyed a phenomenon known as "The Gore Effect" to half-seriously argue their case against global warming. […]The so-called Gore Effect happens when a global warming-related event, or appearance by the former vice president and climate change crusader, Al Gore, is marked by exceedingly cold weather or unseasonably winter weather. […] While there's no scientific proof that The Gore Effect is anything more than a humorous coincidence, some climate skeptics say it may offer a snapshot of proof that the planet isn't warming as quickly as some climate change advocates say.
It happened in Canada this year, sort of, when tickets to a Feb. 21 speech by Mr. Gore at the University of Toronto went on sale – on the coldest Feb. 7 on record for downtown Toronto.
This is an example of what is now called, in urban parlance, the "Gore effect," after the Nobel-prize-winner and former U.S. vice-president. It is defined as, "The phenomenon that leads to record cold temperatures wherever Al Gore goes to deliver an important statement on global warming, or by extension, to sharp temperature drops wherever a major discussion of global warming takes place."
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