Adding to Justin’s Post this morning, it is crazy to see the amount of attention the tropics are getting these days.  As of Monday afternoon Fay was still a tropical storm with winds only at 60 m.p.h., yet its now almost a given to lead off the nightly news.  Believe me, I consider myself to be one of the last people to say weather is not important, but I just hope there aren’t any negative effects on over-doing the attention of minimal storms….in a way crying wolf until a major hurricane hits.  In defense, this could be a good thing … always being prepared for the worse.  Anyhow, here is a satellite image of Fay as of 7 p.m. Friday evening.

and also the forecast track and stats…

Notice how Fay is relatively small in size.  The main core of convection is only about 50 to 75 miles wide.  Fay has shown some strengthening and could become a category one hurricane before making landfall on the gulf coast of Florida early Tuesday morning.  After looking at the computer models, flooding concerns may out-weigh the threat of winds.  Forecast models have projected Fay to stall over Florida and Georgia.  The good news is this will provide much needed rainfall to drought stricken areas.  Yet they may receive more than they want in a short period of time.  For the latest on Fay…here is a good link.

Back home we sure could use the rain as well.  Since June 1st we are now over 4 inches behind in precipitation, and have only received .05" inches of rain in Wausau over the last 2 weeks.

Meteorologist Brian Niznansky

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First off, I see someone commented recently, wondering where they can send pictures into the weather department. We used to have a picture of the week section on the website, but that is gone with the new renovation. For those of you who have some nice nature scenes, wild animal pictures, sunrises, sunsets, Fall color photographs (coming up in a month or so), etc… please send them in to weather@waow.com. This is also the address you can send pictures of severe weather, such as wind damage, lightning, or large hail. We always like to see what is going on out there in the viewing area during severe weather. It helps us verify the issuance of severe thunderstorm and tornado warnings.

I could send in a few pictures of my brown lawn, but that wouldn’t be too exciting, just a sign of the dry weather that has been occurring recently. Over the weekend, there were some thunderstorms on Saturday afternoon and evening  in the northwoods, and even a couple of sprinkles as far south as Rib Mountain, but most locations missed out. A similar situation will occur today. A cold front is moving in from the north and will produce widely scattered thunderstorms this afternoon. If you are lucky enough to get hit by one of these storms, you could end up with a quarter to half inch of rain, but most people will be left wishing and waiting. You might have to wait until Friday for another chance of substantial rain. That is when a stronger cold front will move through the area and bring another chance of thunderstorms. I can’t guarantee any rain amounts, but something would be better than nothing. Also, this year is better than each of the last 5 years (when we had below normal precipitation) because we had plenty of rain in the spring, so crops got off to a good start. In years when it is a dry spring but then wet in late summer the crop yields are typically worse (from my personal experience anyway).

Speaking of wet weather, parts of the southeast U.S. could experience some substantial rainfall over the next 2 to 3 days because of tropical storm Fay. Judging by its ragged appearance this morning and the fact that it will not be over open ocean very long, the odds are it will not become a hurricane before hitting land and if it does, it will be a minimal category 1 hurricane. Given the slow pace of news around the world, Fay will get a lot more coverage than it deserves. We will probably feel more wind from the news coverage than the actual storm. I see that the Florida governor has declared a state of emergency. I can’t remember the last time (if ever) a state of emergency was declared for a tropical storm. I suppose they think it is better to be safe than sorry, however, I would think the costs of evacuations, the activation of emergency personnel, and overtime pay, would have to factor in at some point. At some threshold of certainty it would be cheaper, safer, and more efficient to stay put and not go on high alert. Maybe the governor does not believe the NHC forecast. Hmmm, even I have a tough time confirming the forecast at the moment because the .noaa.gov websites are all getting hammered  (10:15 am) and I cannot get through, and contrary to popular belief I don’t have a red phone in direct connection with the NHC. It would be nice, but rather useless considering we are in Wisconsin. Anyway, if you want to check out the latest on Fay later today you can try www.nhc.noaa.gov. (Seems Fay is already having an indirect negative effect in the U.S. – causing websites to go down).

So back to the original statement. Fay could bring some very beneficial rains to drought-stricken Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina later this week – if as projected – it stalls a while in that part of the country.

Lastly I have a couple of viewer pictures that make Stevens Point look rather drought stricken – don’t worry, it is just a look at the much talked-about drawdown of the Wisconsin River. Authorities wanted to inspect a damn and lowered the river this past weekend. Many people took the opportunity to explore the previously inaccessible landscape – some hoping to find some long-lost artifacts or antique treasure. Bruce O. from Stevens Point used his kite-camera set-up to capture these semi-ariel views. Have a fun Monday! Meteorologist Justin Loew.

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It has been a while since I delved into the climate news, so today I’ll try to get through a bunch of it. I know, it is depressing and repetitive, but I suppose it is good to be reminded of impacts on the environment, whether or not some people think they are over-hyped.

There have been quite a few new reports about how bad anthropogenic global warming (AGW) will be, but it is tough to find anything to new to add to the AGW list. Most of the "bad things" have been predicted over and over for nearly 20 years. I suppose I could start putting numbers behind each "bad thing" in order to indicate how many times we have seen it in the news but it would only start from today’s date and thus might not be too representative, and I don’t have time to search all the news from the last 20 years to get a comprehensive accurate count. So here are some of the recent news items:

Mass extinction of amphibians. (not a conclusive link)

Birds expanding their ranges further north.

More extreme precipitation events.

Many expensive climate troubles are projected for New York City.

More dead zones in the world’s water ways. This has been blamed on AGW in the past but this article puts more of the blame on fertilizer and other types of run-off.

What about rising sea levels? Check out this image of how sea level has changed over the last couple of decades. Some places in the world have seen the sea level go down while others have seen a big rise. The image is a good reminder that not everything changes at the same rate around the world and that there is a complex interplay between temperatures and ocean levels. Ocean circulations change over time and affect sea levels. Also, warmer oceans mean more evaporation, which in turn is a counter-effect of melting glaciers.

Here is a very interesting article about hurricanes and AGW. A new more detailed climate model predicts there will be little if any affect on hurricane activity. For years the mantra has been not only that there will be more hurricanes but that there will be stronger hurricanes. I have highlighted a couple contradictory studies in the past, and this is another one that runs against the orthodoxy. More hurricanes and less hurricanes are both on the AGW list. How can that be? More hurricanes – that is the easy one to understand – more devastation. What about less hurricanes? But of course, there will be more drought in areas such as the southeast U.S. because these areas rely on tropical systems for a portion of their yearly rainfall. Anyway, I suspect the AGW=more hurricanes talk will increase again if another cat 4 or cat 5 hurricane hits the U.S. A couple of tropical waves are causing a little concern right now.

So, a lot of news, but not much new. Thankfully the article about New York lists sooo many bad things that will happen because of AGW that there are 2 new items we can squeeze in. There will be more flooding of the subway lines and more power blackouts. So here is the updated list of bad things that will happen because of AGW:

(power blackouts, more flooded subways, Mountain snowmelt will occur up to 2 months earlier, more bee colony collapse disorder and other multiple infectious disease outbreaks, Caribou populations will decline, 1 in 8 bird species could go extinct – including long distance migratory song birds, eucalyptus leaves will become less nutritious and Koala bears will die, the 2008 tropical storm disaster in Myanmar, Tropical bugs will not reproduce, toxic chemicals will pour out of glaciers, Narwhals will go extinct, more deadly algae blooms, more poverty, a massive increase in volcanic activity, new disease outbreaks from previously frozen corpses, irreversible water circulation alteration in Lake Tahoe, dramatically decreased rice production, fewer flowers in the Rocky Mountains, the Butterfly fish will starve, transportation system will be ruined, air pollution related deaths will increase, tropical fish could go deaf, more “ocean deserts”, more tundra wildfires, collapsing oceanic food webs, sharks devastating Antarctic sea life, the drying up of Lake Mead by 2021, plant-devouring insect invasions, poor food quality, increased human mortality, more solastalgia/mental illness, more wars, the past 1993 conflict in Somalia, more intense heat waves, more heat deaths, polar bears starving, Isle Royale Moose dying, Walruses dying, Penguins starving (including King penguins), Australian bats dying, more hurricanes, less hurricanes, more intense and bigger hurricanes, a longer hurricane season, more stormy weather, rising oceans, more acidic oceans, California wildfires, more droughts, more floods, future disastrous declines in food production, coral reefs (hard and soft) dying, enormous extinctions of plant and animal species, massive loss of fish in the Bering Sea, the earth literally being torn apart, Amazon deforestation, a bigger ozone hole, a smaller ozone hole, less fresh water, more obesity, more hunger, more asthma, more allergies, more infectious disease, more kidney stones…more to come)

Lastly a beautiful sunrise photograph sent in by Sandy Kennedy of Park Falls. Notice the steam fog coming off of the lake. Have a great weekend – Meteorologist Justin Loew.

The story continues to be drier than normal weather. Given the above normal precipitation during the trend during first 6 months of the year I was optimistic that we would finally break our streak of consecutive years with below normal precipitation (which stands at 5). Alas, my optimism has shrunk. August is normally our wettest month of the year (normal precip: 4.53 inches) and so far it is turning out to be the driest in 2008. During the first 2 weeks of the month we only received 0.56 inches of rain which is about 1.5 inches below normal. We are now getting close to 1.5 inches below normal for the year as well and there isn’t much rain on the horizon. The chances of rain for the next week to 10 days are pretty slim. At least on computer model is showing a couple of cold fronts dropping in from Canada. One front late Saturday and another Sunday night into Monday. If an isolated thunderstorm or two does pop-up along these fronts they will most likely be confined to the northern half of the area and most likely north of highway 8. Next week on Wednesday and Thursday a weak trough of low pressure will move in from the south and provide another slight chance of thunderstorms. Dry weather of course means good conditions for getting outdoors so enjoy it while it lasts. Temps will reach the upper 70s today and then remain in the low to mid 80s from Saturday all the way through next week. Some spots might even reach the upper 80s.

Present Weather

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It isn’t officially a drought – the latest US Drought Monitor doesn’t even show abnormally dry conditions – but it is getting close. Officially in Wausau there was 0.01 inches of rain yesterday and that brings our monthly total up to 0.56 inches, which is about an inch and a quarter below normal for the month of August and puts us about the same amount below normal for the year. Some lucky folks ended up under some of the heavier showers yesterday and are not doing too bad. One viewer near Wittenberg emailed a rainfall report of 0.80 inches. A couple of our weather watchers also had some decent amounts: Dick in Merrill reported 0.28 inches, Gitsy in Wild Rose had 0.60 inches, Pat in Arkdale checked in with 0.25 inches, and Tom in Nekoosa reported 0.50 inches.

Once again today there will be some "lucky" spots with a bit heavier showers or thunderstorms, but most of us will end up dry. By this evening a big high pressure system will move in from the north and completely take over the weather picture. This high pressure system should keep the skies mostly clear tonight and all the way through the weekend. It will be beautiful late summer weather, just a little too dry. High temps should be in the mid 70s today, climb into the upper 70s Friday, reach the low 80s on Saturday, and then top out in the low to mid 80s from Sunday through Tuesday.

The weather will turn more humid during the middle of next week and a storm system should approach the area from the south. This will bring a chance of thunderstorms with the potential for heavier rain (Wednesday and Thursday). High temps will remain in the low 80s late next week.

The Concrete Life (3) (Part 1 , Part 2)

So the problem of congestion, expansion, and pollution in U.S. urban areas seem insurmountable. Opinions and attitudes are entrenched, people own gas guzzlers, houses have been built, and superhighways stretch for miles. It is hard to imagine houses and freeways being DE-constructed or DE-commissioned and more green space returning. Politicians attempting to institute such measures would likely lose their jobs. What could be the driving force to more efficiency? The one factor that no one can avoid is the high cost of fossil fuels. Even though the price has com down some in recent weeks, it is unlikely to fall much further. The most optimistic forecasters say the price of a barrel of oil could get as low as $70 within a year. I don’t believe it. It is a "tight" commodity and the price will not come down dramatically until a new, abundant, cheap energy source is developed. This is where the incremental changes I mentioned yesterday will come into play. We will likely see the adoption of different energy sources and transportation options develop gradually over the next decade or so before there is a tipping point. The only way to make it happen quicker would be to raise taxes on fossil fuels so that the price of gas was $10 or more dollars a gallon, such as Al Gore proposed when he wrote "Earth in the Balance". Taxing the profits of oil companies will do nothing but cause American oil companies to go bankrupt and cause even more of our money to be spent on foreign oil.

With the high price of gas and concern over the climate more people are looking into the alternatives and more companies are developing better products. Just today a Canadian company Day4 Solar announced a better solar cell design that boosts the energy efficiency up silicon cells up to 17%. The commercial industry standard is 14%. The is the type of incremental change that matters. Companies like First Solar continue to pump out thin film solar products. More countries are starting to invest in billion dollar solar projects – such as India. We read about these developments everyday, but since the improvements are incremental, it doesn’t seem like life has changed all that much. Even without fancy new technology, we can cut down on our impact through simple measures – as this study from the University of Minnesota has found. Small changes in behavior and the adoption of smaller cars could cut fossil fuel usage by 30%. This article claims the U.S. could cut its oil and gas usage by 30 to 50% by 2035 by switching over to hybrid vehicles, and there is huge demand for hybrids and plug-in hybrids. According to this article, there are over 30,000 people already waiting to buy the Chevy Volt. Why such an interest in plug-in hybrids? They will go farther than an electric car because they have gas back-up power. If you only drive 10 or 20 miles, you can run on electric. If you need a little more, then you use some gas. As batteries and ultracapacitors develop higher energy densities, eventually, people will go all electric. So how long will those 30,000 people have to wait for a Volt? Two more years. Which makes me wonder what the delay is. GM should be working on the Volt 24/7 365 days a year. They have all the pieces together and are testing it on test tracks right now. Why the heck will it take 2 more years to release it? Knowing how well GM (and the other American car companies) have executed things in the last few years, I suspect Honda, Toyota, Saab, Volkswagen, and Kia, will get the hybrids out sooner and completely dominate the market.

The one technology I don’t think will have too much of an impact in the auto industry is hydrogen (although hydrogen fuel cells might work good for storing electricity from intermittent alternative sources like solar and wind). In the case of hybrid and electric cars, all the technology is already here and the infrastructure is in place. All we have to do is plug and go. With hydrogen, nothing is ready to go and experts say it will be at least 10 or 20 years before the hydrogen concept would be widespread and reasonably affordable. Yet some states are already spending millions of dollars building hydrogen gas stations and promoting hydrogen vehicles. I know their hearts are in the right place, but they need to get their heads out of the dirt. Using hydrogen is not as efficient as just going with electricity and the infrastructure is going to cost a gazillion dollars (as if supporting the concrete life was not enough to break the bank already). You might have heard about this hydrogen car tour going across the country right now. Could someone please stop them. In the past when data was sparse, a bad project could be excused – maybe there was just not enough information to make accurate predictions about the future. That is not an excuse nowadays. It is easier to find what works and move in that direction. The hydrogen car push is a huge waste of time and money.

So change is coming slow and it doesn’t look like the expansion of buildings and freeways will stop anytime soon, but at least with the adoption of hybrid and electric vehicles there will be less noise and cleaner air. It is a start.

Space News:

How about those Enceladus pictures coming from Cassini? The mission scientists say that you can see blocks of ice in the fissures on the surface, but I have had a hard time spotting them. Also, even though Cassini passed within 30 miles of the surface, all of the useful images were taken from a couple thousand miles away. What is up with that? I wonder why they were unable to get images from close-up? Perhaps the spacecraft was moving too fast.

If you don’t like photographs of alien lands such as Enceladus, how about a beautiful sunrise photograph from here on earth. This picture was taken by Donna Zygarlicke of Marshfield

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This is a continuation of Monday’s blog post

So there is a vicious cycle of ever expanding cities, highways, and increased traffic across the U.S., and it is even happening in Wausau at a rapid pace. What used to be top quality farmland is now turning into pavement and subdivisions. I lament the fact that former greenery is now concrete, however, as a society we need to know how many people share this view before we decide how to fix it. People love to live in the burbs, have there own house, and drive their own car. Most folks offer platitudes about keeping greenspace intact but who among us is willing to give up their car or house in order to live in a condo or apartment downtown and ride the bus or train to work and school. Not many I suppose. So is it a lost cause from the get-go?

The one big factor that is changing people’s attitudes is the price of raw materials – including gas. The increased price is going to make commuting long distances and maintaining all of the transportation infrastructure a near impossible task within the next 5 to 10 years (in my estimation). So the choice will be to cling on to the traditional suburban home and multiple autos and go broke, or switch to a life closer to work and most likely in an Urban center. There is no question that Urban living is better for energy efficiency and reducing pollution but it takes some getting used to. Will people change? I doubt it. Look how long it took for people to adjust to the high gas prices. The price spiked 3 years ago and there are still people today who think taxing the oil companies "windfall" profits will help bring down the price of gas or at least help out in some way. Pure Fantasy. So how long do you expect people will complain about higher gas taxes (and taxes in general) to maintain our aging transportation infrastructure? I have no doubt there will be many years of griping before the majority of people will take the matter into their own hands and make adjustments to their lifestyle.

I like having my own house and growing a garden, but I would much prefer having financial stability (if it came down to that choice). Living in an apartment or condo "downtown" is do-able and even desirable for a few people, but not for most. In order to maintain suburban living, while at the same time reducing the need for ever expanding roadways and ending congestion, we would need mass transit (such as high speed trains), and a lot of it. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a high speed train running between Point and Wausau? You could make the trip between the 2 downtown areas in about 15 to 20 minutes. Unfortunately, the U.S. government has performed quite poorly  at instituting mass transit (understatement of the year) and this has soured most people opinion’s of rail service. If more private companies got involved in the biz, then I think we could end up with a more desirable and beneficial mass transit system. But these things take a lot of planning and need approval from local, state, and national governments – which wastes a ton of time.

Sorry to end on a down note for all of you hoping for a more efficient nation, preservation/expansion of greenspace, less traffic congestion, and clean gleaming cities with useful mass transit. It ain’t gonna happen anytime soon. Change will be incremental and it will take a lot longer than anyone expects – even with high gas prices (although $10 per gallon gas would speed the process up). (2nd caveat: if you accept the premise of the technological Singularity then all bets are off the table).

What incremental progress will we see in the next 5 to 10 years? You get a hint of these things from this blog every week and I have a lot of recent news to share, but it will have to wait until tomorrow.

Present Weather:

There is a chance of showers and isolated thunderstorms today, then is looks like clear sailing all the way through the weekend and even early next week. Normally this would be a good thing, as it gives everyone an opportunity to get outside, however, precipitation has been below normal and we could use some heavy rain. At this point it doesn’t look like any good soaking rains are int the works until the mid to latter part of next week. Looks like I’ll be watering the garden a couple more times.

Meteorologist Justin Loew

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I know.. I know… lets enjoy the summer before we start talking about winter, but I thought it would be fun to check out some early outlooks for precipitation/temperatures for the upcoming 08/09 Winter season.  The National Weather Service’s Climate Prediction Center provides various 3 month outlooks.  The maps well look at will be 3 months spans using 5 totals months of November through April. 

First Temperatures:

Each 3 month outlooks means one thing, we have a better chance of a warmer winter than a cooler winter, actually we have a better chance of this than anyone else across the country.  White areas are Equal Chance(EC), while orange and red colors represent greater chances of warmer then average weather.  According to the Climate Prediction Center’s maps…we have over a 50% greater chance of seeing a warmer winter than vice versa….so in other words 2 to 1 for the gamblers out there:).

As Far as temperatures ….Nothing to exciting…we have equal chances across the board.

For an in – depth discussion on how these predictions are made..check out this link.

After a brutal cold winter last year…this would be a big turnaround.

Meteorologist Brian Niznansky

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Not much time for a blog post today as I will be heading to Merrill to discuss severe weather safety. I have a lot of news to get to, but it will have to wait until later this week – same goes for the second part of "The Concrete Life".

In the weather, the main story continues to be the recent dry spell. A weak trough of low pressure will bring scattered showers and isolated thunderstorms to much of the area this afternoon, overnight, and Wednesday morning. Unfortunately, the rainfall will not be too heavy. I expect 0.25 to 0.50 inches in a few areas. By Wednesday afternoon the clouds will start to break-up and it looks like a drier trend late this week into the weekend. It will be beautiful summer weather, just a little too dry. High temps will be in the mid 70s today and Wednesday, then rise into the upper 70s Thursday and Friday, and eventually the mercury should reach the low 80s over the weekend.

Have a terrific Tuesday! Meteorologist Justin Loew.

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I had a chance to get away from work this weekend and take a short fishing trip in central Minnesota. Getting to the destination meant traveling through the Twin Cities…on Friday…very close to rush hour. As was the case back in June when I traveled to L.A., I was amazed at the amount of traffic on the road. Because of the high price of gas, Americans are driving a lot less nowadays. During the past year we have seen the amount of miles driven decrease by 1 to 2% according to some surveys. This might not sound like much, but this is a nation which rarely, if ever, has seen a decrease in miles driven throughout it’s entire history. If the amount of miles driven is going down, I didn’t really notice much in the Twin Cities. There were traffic jams galore. The interesting thing is that this happens day after day, year after year, and people keep putting up with it. It boggles my mind how so many people can waste so much of their lives tied up in traffic. We are talking about a couple hours per day in many cases. Why do they do it? It seems, because they want to live in the suburbs instead of the inner city. People want a house and a yard and some space. They want to live in a low crime area and have good schools for their kids (inner city schools are notoriously sub-standard). So I guess it is a trade-off. Putting up with the headaches of travel, in order to enjoy other benefits.

Given the high price of gas, the trade-off might start tipping away from the suburbs and back to the inner city. I know that the price of oil has come down recently, but we aren’t heading back to $2.00 a gallon of gas any time soon. If we are lucky, it might drop below $3.50 later this year or maybe even get close to $3.00 (if we are REAL lucky), but the long term supply/demand ratio would indicate high (and higher) prices are here to stay. Not only does this make commuting expensive for the individual, it makes infrastructure repair and development more expensive. Each new mile of pavement is more expensive than the last. Add in inflation and the picture is even worse. The rapidly increasing  cost will end up breaking the bank of local, state, and national funds dedicated to roadways (in my opinion). We see stories of this popping up already and it will only get worse. (Ok, here is where an optimist would mention some new whiz-bang technology that would rapidly reduce the cost of building roads, and there could be some improvements on the way, but nothing in the near term – let’s say the next 5 to 10 years).

So what is the easiest option? Break the cycle. Stop building roads. Easier said than done. Building roads is a vicious cycle that begets more roads, and I am afraid it will affect the Wausau area very soon as well, bringing big city gridlock. I was a part of this cycle back in the late 1990s. I lived on the west side where 17th Avenue was being expanded. The house I lived in was demolished (as well as several others) in order to make the street wider – to allow more cars and reduce traffic congestion. Well, it worked, and now more cars are able to travel on 17th avenue and more cars are leading to more plans for expansion. Removing a handful of houses doesn’t seem like that big of a deal, but those people (including me) had to find a new place to live and with less real estate available in the city center, the logical choice for most people is to move to the outskirts. The same thing is happening with the Thomas street expansion plans. Houses will be removed and replaced with an expanded road, which will bring more traffic and force more people to move away from the city center. With more people living on the outskirts, it makes sense for some businesses to locate closer to the people on the outskirts. This results in paving over more land and creating more roads and more congestion. Big freeway interchanges also displace homes and businesses, such as what is happening on the west side of Wausau. Pretty soon you end up with a situation such as the Twin Cities where you are driving on a 6 lane freeway and you are so far away from the city center (at least 25 miles) that you can’t even see what was originally responsible for the vast concrete arteries on which so many people waste so much of their lives. The amount of land that is covered by concrete is so large that it boggles the mind, and if you think the Twin Cities is bad, you should see L.A. We end up with cities that are truly designed for automobiles and not for people. This vicious cycle has happened in every large American city and no one has yet been able to stop it. Well, perhaps the price of gas will finally out an end to it. Nothing changes ingrained attitudes quicker than the prospect of being destitute. So where do we go from here? How do we break the cycle? That will have to be the topic of a future blog post, since this one is already getting rather long. Check back on Wednesday for a continuation of the "Concrete Life".

Present Weather

The main concern in the weather is the recent dry trend. The last 2 to 3 weeks have been below normal on precipitation and it doesn’t look like much is on the way for the next 4 to 5 days. The situation isn’t as bad as the last 5 years, but it will stress the crops a bit this week. We have a 30% chance of showers and thunderstorms tomorrow and Wednesday, but it doesn’t look like anything too heavy. A storm system moving through the Midwest this weekend is showing some potential for more widespread and heavy rainfall, but it is too early to guarantee anything. At least it is not dry AND hot. High temps will range from 75 to 80 from today all the way through the weekend.

Space News:

The big news for today is Cassini’s very close fly-by of Saturn’s moon Enceladus. It will be flying within 30 miles of the surface and taking a detailed look at the fissures on the south pole of Enceladus that are ejecting plumes of water into space. Even before official images and scientific data are released, you can keep track of the action at the official Cassini blog.

On the Martian front, Phoenix continues to experience trouble getting soil samples into it’s thermal gas analyzer. Who knew scooping an dumping soil would be so difficult. I know that designers of this equipment typically go through many simulations to replicate the conditions they will encounter on other planets, but they seemed to have missed something with regards to Martian soil, because the equipment is sure having trouble with such a seemingly simple task.

Meteorologist Justin Loew

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Quiet weather will continue through the remainder of the weekend with bright days and cool nights.  Lows tonight and again Sunday night will dip into the middle to upper 40s north and around 50 degrees elsewhere.  High temperatures will be a few degrees below average with readings in the upper 70s.  We certainly could use some rainfall but it looks like we’ll have to wait until late Tuesday into Wednesday for our next opportunity.  Unfortunately, significant precipitation is not expected because we still won’t be able to tap into the deep Gulf moisture that we need for a good dousing.

I received some phone calls and e-mails about when the Perseids Meteor Shower is taking place and it peaks on August 12th through August 13th but you can most likely see them the night of the 10th and 11th.  The best place to view is in a dark, open sky away from pollution and city lights.  Look towards the NE sky shortly after midnight.  At its peak, you can see up to 80 "shooting stars" or meteors per hour which is quite a bit!  Check out this article for more information!

I saw some interesting pictures today from Fort Dodge, Iowa of a very weak and tiny tornado.  It was very picturesque and you could see clearing in the background with the sun illuminating it very nicely.  No damage was done but it was very photogenic.  Here a few pictures below courtesy of KCCI in Des Moines, IA:

I thought it was beautiful – from the reports I read many people spotted this tornado in that particular area.  The storm didn’t look too impressive on radar and if it wasn’t actually spotted on the ground, it may have gone unnoticed but luckily there were enough trained spotters, law enforcement and public out there to report it.  That is all for tonight, have a great night!

Meteorologist Megan Syner

Posted under Science

I was mentioning yesterday that no matter how low the precipitation chances are, it seems you can never completely rule it out here in Wisconsin. Most of the area had plenty of sunshine yesterday but the northeast did experience some isolated showers. Today should be dry but late tonight through midday Saturday, I have to bring in a slight chance of showers once again. A cold front moving in from the north will bring the slight chance to the northwoods late tonight through early morning tomorrow. The front will move into central Wisconsin by about midday and then be south of the area by mid afternoon. Since there is not much moisture and the front is moving through during the morning, the odds of any substantial rainfall are minimal. Any showers will be brief and light. By mid to late afternoon skies should be sunny once again.

High pressure will take over the weather for Sunday and most of Monday leading to mostly sunny skies and very nice temps for this time of year. The highest chance of rainfall in the extended outlook will be on Tuesday, although I can’t guarantee everyone will end up with some rain. There is a slight chance of thunderstorms later next week as well.

The high temperatures are one part of the forecast the will not be changing much at all for the next week or so. It looks like the highs will be in the 75 to 80 range most of the time. Low temps will be a bit more variable. Most nights the temps will dip into the mid to upper 50s but on Sunday and Monday mornings a few spots will fall into low 40s.

Energy News:

Ethanol might not be dead yet! Well, corn/grain ethanol seems to be on the way out, the only people supporting it are politicians trying to buy votes. Ok, maybe that is a little harsh. I know a few people in the industry and they have put their heart and soul into the ethanol effort. It was worth a try, we ran the experiment, and it hasn’t turned out that great. The EROI on ethanol is barely over 1 and grain prices have shot through the roof. The rise in food prices is only partly due to ethanol production, but it is contributing. So how can ethanol be saved? By switching feedstock sources. Giant Miscanthus Grass could produce 2.5 times more ethanol per acre of land than corn or switchgrass. This might not be enough make ethanol the most attractive option, but it would relieve some of the stress on food prices, and blunt some of the critics.

A different energy story that is gaining steam is LED lighting. If you remember late last year, I featured a product from Polybrite and dubbed it a "true revolution in lighting". It was an LED bulb for your house – even more energy efficient than compact fluorescent bulbs. It appears, the company could not get a mass manufacturing deal and thus the bulbs are still priced out of the consumer market. You can buy one for $50 online. However, a lot of businesses are adopting LED lighting in order to save money. It is a good sign that there is still hope for these energy conserving money saving lights will find their way into our homes.

Even though congress failed to extend solar energy subsidies, companies like Sempra are moving forward with new power plants. This is a good sign for the entire industry. Even though Sempra is betting on the government subsidies eventually being extended, they must be making enough money to keep forging ahead.

On the VERY alternative energy front, some people are promoting the use of giant kites to generate electricity. The kites will harvest energy from the wind just like wind turbines. Since kites can fly higher in the sky and tap into the jet stream (which is a more persistent wind), there is a potential to produce more energy than wind turbines and do it cheaply. Here is how it would work: the kite is connected to a generator by a string. As the giant kite flies up into the sky it would turn the generator and make electricity. Once the kite "is at the end of its rope" it would be retracted and sent up again. The article linked above quotes a physicist who says a multi-kite system could generate 1 gigawatt of electricity. Wow! I don’t believe it. Not yet. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but it just seems too simple. For one thing, it will take energy to reel it back in, that is unless the aerodynamics of the kite can be changed so that it comes back in easily. If the wind suddenly "drops off" or diminishes, then the kite might come crashing to the ground. Also, air planes would have to know the location of all the kites in order to avoid crashes.

Finally, you know I am excited about the prospect of electric vehicles, as they seem to be the best bet for the future of transportation (knowing what we know today). So, how about this mini electric vehicle from Mitsubishi? It looks similar to the Tata Nano, but this one is electric. The numbers are pretty amazing. Its small electric engine can crank out 63 horsepower. It goes 0 to 60 mph in 9 seconds and has a top speed of 82 mph. Best yet, it can get 75 miles per charge. Wow! Double wow! I know a lot of people in this country that would like to buy that car right now. Per usual, it won’t be available in the U.S. for a couple years. What a downer. I would buy one, as long as the price was reasonable – around $15,000 or less. I would find it hard to justify paying more than that because it is so small.

Have a stupendous weekend! Meteorologist Justin Loew.

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