- Bishop Hill blog - The big cutoff

Fred Pearce is on the receiving end of the full fury of the warmosphere for his article about the Lisbon conference in New Scientist.

Some interesting thoughts on Antarctic peninsula warming | Watts Up With That?

Due to the southward shift of the storm track, a high SAM index is associated with anomalously dry conditions over southern South America, New Zealand and Tasmania and wet conditions over much of Australia and South Africa. The stronger westerlies above the Southern Ocean also increase the insulation of the Antarctica. As a result, there is less heat exchange between the tropics and the poles, leading to a cooling of the Antarctica and the surrounding seas. However, the Antarctic Peninsula warms due to a western wind anomaly bringing maritime air onto the Peninsula (Fig. 5.9). Indeed, the ocean surrounding the Antarctic Peninsula is in general warmer than the Peninsula itself and stronger westerly winds mean more heat transport onto the Peninsula. Over the ocean, the stronger westerly winds tend to generate stronger eastward currents. Furthermore, the divergence of the currents at the ocean surface around 60oS is enhanced because of a larger wind-induced Ekman transport. This results in a stronger oceanic upwelling there.