Highways baking at 70 degrees C hint at scorching summer across China, US

By Brian K Sullivan, Joe Wertz and Mary Hui

 

In northern China, road surfaces have soared to 158F (70C). In California’s Central Valley, temperatures are reaching into the triple digits Fahrenheit. Across much of Spain, the mercury has risen so high that it’s prompting warnings for tourists. 

 

Weeks before the official start of the Northern Hemisphere’s summer, signs are emerging that the coming months will be blistering in North America, Europe and Asia. There’s even a chance that the season could shatter global high-temperature records, said Daniel Swain, a climatologist at the University of California, Los Angeles.

 

The scorching conditions threaten to tax power grids, wilt crops and send energy prices soaring across three continents. Hot, dry weather is also elevating the risk of wildfires, with blazes already erupting in Alberta, the epicenter of Canada’s oil industry. The human and economic consequences are dire: Extreme heat is expected to inflict about $200 billion in annual losses in the US alone by 2030, a number that will more than double by 2050, according to one estimate.  

 

All three northern continents face sweltering temperatures fueled by climate change — particularly the western and central US and Canada, as well as western and northern Europe, Swain said. Because a warmer atmosphere holds more moisture, these regions will also see areas of intense rain and flooding, he said.

 

“I’d expect to see further instances of extreme to record-shattering downpours and flood events in regions prone to heavy precipitation during the warm season,” Swain said.

 

In the Atlantic, the heat is raising ocean temperatures, boosting the odds of an unusually active hurricane season. The absence of El Niño, a warming of the equatorial Pacific that can cause storm-wrecking wind conditions across the Atlantic, also means more hurricanes and tropical storms may develop and grow in the Atlantic and Caribbean, including oil- and gas-producing areas along the US Gulf Coast.

 

Due to kinks in the summer jet stream, there is a rising chance of derechos – wide arcs of severe thunderstorms that can travel hundreds of miles and cause billions of dollars in damage — across the Midwest and northern Plains, said Paul Pastelok, lead US long-range forecaster at AccuWeather Inc. This turmoil across the continent may also leave the Gulf Coast, particularly Texas, vulnerable to more hurricane strikes. 

 

The sizzling weather will increase energy demand. About 89 million people across three grids spanning parts of the central US are at elevated risk of power supply shortfalls this summer, according to the North American Electric Reliability Corp. Power prices across the grid stretching from Chicago to the Mid-Atlantic are likely to rise with sustained heat because of low coal stockpiles, Bank of America analysts led by Francisco Blanch wrote in a note to clients. New England power is also vulnerable to spikes, the analysts said.

 

US natural gas price gains have been muted so far despite the prospect of hot weather and rising exports of the power-plant fuel to Europe and Asia. But the chances of gas reaching $4.60 per million British thermal units this year — a jump of more than 30 per cent from current levels — are rising as the heat could limit stockpile increases, leaving the market primed for a rally before winter heating demand kicks in, according to analysts with RBC Capital markets led by Christopher Louney.

 

Extreme heat also threatens to wither crops and shrivel rivers, raising food prices as the cost of goods and services remains elevated. Drought has been intensifying in areas of the US where soy, corn or wheat is grown. If the parched conditions persist, water levels on the Mississippi River could drop, roiling barge traffic that’s crucial to transporting crops across the country.

 

Dry Europe 

Across Europe, the world’s fastest-warming continent, little rainfall and early drying has set the stage for intense heat waves, droughts and dangerous wildfire conditions, commercial meteorologists and government forecasters say.

 

Forecast models favor high-pressure weather patterns emerging and enduring this summer, similar to ones that plagued the continent during the first few months of the year. Those patterns suppressed wind speeds and cloud cover, leading to low wind generation and record solar power in Europe — a scenario likely to repeat this summer, according to Atmospheric G2.

 

The high pressure is also likely to block North Atlantic ocean moisture, boosting the risk of heat waves and worsening drought, said Andrew Pedrini, a meteorologist with the weather analytics firm. 

 

“I personally fear that we will hear a lot about extremes this summer,” he said.

 

In Portugal and Spain last week, one of the hottest air masses in more than three decades pushed in from Africa, sending temperatures above 100F. The heat comes after an April 28 blackout left the Iberian Peninsula without electricity for hours, hitting public transport, telecommunications systems and other services. 

 

With high pressure isolating regions from the cooling effect of moist westerly winds, temperatures in central and southern Europe could climb especially high. While that pattern is expected to reduce the chances of rain, rising heat could supercharge storms that do manage to form with torrential rain and damaging hail.

 

Though water levels on the Rhine River have improved after rains in recent weeks, a recurrence of drought could upend a crucial trade route and send barge rates soaring.

 

Long-term forecast models show conditions could support heavy rain in western Norway and the northern UK from June through August, according to data from Europe’s Copernicus satellite program.

 

Asia Outlook 

In Asia, Japan will likely have a warmer-than-normal summer, according to the Japan Meteorological Agency. Southeast Asia will also be hotter than average, the ASEAN Specialised Meteorological Centre said.

 

China, with the exception of some far northern areas, is expected to bake this June as well, the China Meteorological Administration said. Drought in the northern part of the country has hit the wheat crop during a key growth period, threatening output of a staple food grain just as Beijing remains entangled in a trade war with the US, a major agricultural products supplier. 

 

Though rains are forecast in the region, providing some relief to the parched farm fields, the quick swing from dry to wet raises the risk of floods, landslides and crop damage. 

 

Already, intense heat in parts of China has sent asphalt temperatures surging. The National Energy Administration expects peak electricity demand to be about 100 gigawatts higher this summer than last year, the equivalent of needing to turn on all the power plants in the UK at once.

 

Across the Northern Hemisphere, the extreme heat is a reflection of how much warmer the Earth is compared with a few decades ago, Swain said. Since 1959, Europe in particular, but parts of the Pacific Northwest, northeastern Canada, as well as parts of Mexico, Africa and the Middle East have seen a marked increase in summer heat.

 

“An increase in heat extremes is the most obvious symptom of climate change,” said Karen McKinnon, a professor who studies the statistics behind climate change at UCLA. “Even seemingly small changes in temperatures of a few degrees can make summers feel substantially more extreme.”