Climate Impacts on the Pacific Northwest

Winter Quarter 2011
ATMS 585A / ENVIR 585A / ESS 585A / SMA 585A
Amy Snover & Nathan Mantua

Additional Resources

More up-to-date links and information can be found on the Climate Impacts Group's website

Jump to...

• Historical Climate Data
• Current Conditions
• Seasonal/Interannual Climate Forecasts
• Human-Caused Climate Change
• Modes of Natural Climate Variability (El Niño/La Niña, Pacific Decadal Oscillation, Arctic Oscillation)
• Other climate links

Historical Climate Data

• Look up the climate of almost any US city 
• Seasonal forecasts of temperature and precipitation for the continental US
• Western US Historical Climate Summaries (station data)
• Climate Diagnositics Center Interactive Web Tools (plot climate data from 1948-present) 

Current Conditions

Global/Continental:

• Climate indices archived by NOAA's Climate Prediction Center
• Climate Diagnostics Center Maproom

El Niño Southern Oscillation:

• NOAA's TOGA-TAO buoy data
• NOAA Climate Prediction Center Weekly Updates

US Pacific Northwest:

• NOAA/NCDC monthly Northern Hemisphere snow report
• Current Washington snowpack & precipitation statistics from NRCS/Snotel data
• Snotel precipitation and snowpack graph
• Northwest River Forecast Center quick look at Columbia River basin conditions 
• Seattle water supply graphs

Climate Forecasts (Seasonal to Interannual)

• National Center for Environmental Prediction: US seasonal precipitation and temperature probabilities
• International Research Institute for Climate Predictions
• European Center for Medium Range Weather Forecasts: Equatorial Pacific SST plumes

Human Caused Climate Change

• Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
• US Global Change Research Program
• Current greenhouse gas concentrations (CDIAC)
• Comprehensive list of online climate change resources from the Pacific Institute
• A very comprehensive collection of links on climate change compiled by Yahoo

Major Modes of Natural Climate Variability (ENSO, PDO, AO)

El Niño/La Niña:

• NOAA's Office of Global Programs ENSO site  - complete guide to ENSO, past, present, and future.
• El Niño and Climate Prediction - "Reports to the Nation" paper on El Niño, comprehensive and written for the layperson.
• The El Niño Theme Page - (NOAA PMEL) lots of graphics.
• La Niña animations - comparison of past events.
• A comprehensive collection of links to El Niño web sites.
• International Research Institute on ENSO forecasts and impacts.
• Forecasts from PMEL.
• El Niño Advisory from the Climate Prediction Center.
• Coupled ocean-atmosphere predictions from Australia's Bureau of Meteorology Research Centre.
• The 1997/98 El Niño - a comprehensive list of links to media stories and information (compiled by Steven Hare).

Pacific Decadal Oscillation:

• JISAO PDO page

Arctic Oscillation:

• JISAO Arctic Oscillation Page

Other Links

• Puget Sound regional synthesis model (PRISM) project.