This topic has been an enduring hobby horse of climate alarmists, but for a change here it seems a new process in the Arctic could ‘save the day’ – scientists say. Introducing ‘Arctic Atlantification’. Anything that breaks the seemingly endless cycle of ‘climate breakdown’ style doom-laden speculation about these northern ocean currents is surely at least worth a look. Unsurprisingly, we’re told more research (modelling?) is needed but at least a note of uncertainty is present, rather than the usual ‘watch out’ tones.
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Key Atlantic Ocean currents that appear to be slowing down due to climate change may be more resilient to global warming than scientists previously thought — thanks to a secret back-up system, a new study shows.

The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) is a web of currents that loops around the Atlantic like a giant conveyor belt, says LiveScience.

Cold, salty waters sink near Greenland then travel south along the ocean floor. Eventually these waters rise to the surface again near Antarctica and return north, bringing balmier waters to the Northern Hemisphere. This system is crucial to warming Europe, in particular.

In recent years, experts have repeatedly sounded the alarm bell [Talkshop comment – despite counter-evidence], suggesting the step in which waters sink could cease completely, which could lead to a massive drop in temperatures in Northern Europe and exacerbate sea level rise along the U.S. East Coast, among other impacts.

Dense water formation in the Nordic Seas has decreased since 1993, which spells trouble for the entire Atlantic circulation system — were it not for a newly found back-up system, Årthun said. The researchers published their findings Friday (July 11) in the journal Science Advances.

Arctic “Atlantification”
For the study, Årthun and his colleagues fed density measurements from the subpolar North Atlantic, Nordic Seas and Arctic Ocean into a computer model. They compared the results with available observations to check that the simulation accurately mirrored processes in this region.

The simulation confirmed that the Arctic Ocean is undergoing a process called “Atlantification.”

“Atlantification refers to the transition of the Arctic Ocean from a cold, ice-covered state to a warm, more ice-free state,” Årthun said.

Recent decades have seen sea ice in the Barents Sea — a region of the Arctic Ocean that is situated between Scandinavia and Svalbard — retreat farther and farther north, Årthun said. “We expect the Barents Sea to be the first Arctic region to become ice-free,” he said, adding that Atlantic waters are now also spreading into the Eurasian Basin, north of the Barents Sea.

Atlantification of the Arctic Ocean means the region is creating more dense water than it was previously, Årthun said.

“We find that this decrease [in dense water formation] in the Nordic Seas has been compensated for by more dense water formation in the Barents Sea and north of Svalbard,” he said. “These two regions have experienced a retreating sea ice edge […], hence increasing the area over which dense waters can be produced.”

The authors think this back-up system could help to sustain the AMOC. “There are processes that add resilience to the AMOC, perhaps making a serious weakening or collapse less likely,” Årthun said.

Full article here.
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Image credit: researchgate.net

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July 13, 2025 at 10:54AM

51.11511 -2.92203 Met Office CIMO Assessed Class 5 Temperature readings from 1/7/2007

The Westonzoyland weather station is located in the grounds of Somerset Willow Growers , who as well as growing the willow, produce crafted willow products and offer training courses. This site is consequently described by the Met Office as an “Educational” status site though it is still an official “climate reporting” site.

The site was only installed/adopted in 2007 thus the Met Office really has no excuse for adding into the historic climate record such inferior quality sites. The vast majority of sites being opened even now are only very low grade and even suspiciously intended to produce unnatural results such as Whitesands. From the outset this Westonzoyland site was never going to be representative of anywhere other than its own hedged in location, with car parking and a track immediately alongside for motorised vehicles.

The 10 metre radius encircled area above includes a reverse parked vehicle with hardstanding to the south west of the screen in front of al those buildings. Widening out the view to the 100 metre radius encircled area for a Class 1 site demonstrates how hugely compromised this “rural” site actually is.

Briefly assessing the observations record also indicates major deficiencies. 2015 offered no readings whatsoever, 2016 only half the year, 2017 with 62 days missing readings. The archives suggest personal issues for these absent readings, whilst that may be personally regrettable it really is of no concern to the important issues at stake. If the Met Office chose to adopt such sites they should ensure adequate quality – the implications are far too important to run much of the Met Office like a “cottage industry”

Finally, the real problem goes much deeper still. I referred above to a track for motorised vehicles though that may not be fully evident in the headline image. This is actually how the cosy, sheltered site is frequently used as evidenced from Google historic images.

Regularly driving and parking motorhomes and caravans so absurdly close to the screen renders the site totally unusable. There really is no scientific credibility in using data from this site. The Met Office must be held accountable – they know these sites are junk so why keep adding them to the system. The accusation of having a “warming agenda” to prove is becoming ever more hard to refute.

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July 13, 2025 at 10:36AM

By Paul Homewood

 

https://gridwatch.co.uk/

As the Telegraph reported, the lack of wind and excess of solar power has been playing havoc with our grid this week, pushing up prices as gas has to come to the rescue.

At 12.50, solar peaked at 13.5GW, supplying nearly half of Britain’s power. Twelve hours later, of course, there would have been blackouts without the 10GW supplied by CCGT plants.

Tripling solar power capacity, as Mad Miliband wants, won’t solve this problem, it will make matters much worse. Three times nothing is still nothing; meanwhile the grid will have 15GW too much at midday.

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July 13, 2025 at 09:56AM

By Paul Homewood

OFGEM have just announced the first tranche of investment in Britain’s grid upgrades needed to hit 2030 renewable targets.

 

Ofgem has today (1 July) given the provisional green light to an initial £24bn investment programme to enhance energy security while enabling the transmission of more clean energy from renewable sources. 

Over £15bn will ensure the continued safe operation of Great Britain’s gas transmission and distribution networks, making sure they deliver safe and secure supplies of gas to households and businesses across the UK. 

An initial £8.9bn investment is being committed to Britain’s high-voltage electricity network, with a further £1.3bn ready to go – to power the biggest expansion of the electricity grid since the 1960s. The draft settlement is the first step in an estimated £80bn investment programme boosting electricity network capacity, protecting UK households from the volatile international gas markets that caused the massive fluctuations in energy bills in recent years. 

The investment in our grid, which will rise to around four times the current spending levels, will allow for 80 transmission projects and all associated works right across the country to be completed within five years. This will significantly increase the grid’s capacity, through new power lines, substations and other technologies, to handle the flow of electricity from new renewable sources. 

These projects, which are also vital for driving growth, will upgrade over 4400km of overhead lines and deliver 3500km of new circuits, including investments offshore, doubling the total build in the last 10 years. It means up to 126 GW of clean power generation will be connected to the grid by 2030 alongside additional flexible storage and technologies, enough to power millions of households with clean, stable and secure energy. 

Ofgem CEO Jonathan Brearley said:

“Britain’s reliance on imported gas has left us at the mercy of volatile international gas prices which during the energy crisis would have caused bills to rise as high as £4000 for an average household without government support. Even today the price cap can move up or down by hundreds of pounds with little we can do about it. 

“This record investment will deliver a homegrown energy system that is better for Britain and better for customers. It will ensure the system has greater resilience against shocks from volatile gas prices we don’t control. 

“These 80 projects are a long-term insurance policy against threats to Britain’s energy security and the instability of prices. By bringing online dozens of homegrown, renewable generation sites and modernising our energy system to the one we will need in the future we can boost growth and give ourselves more control over prices too. 

“Doing nothing is not an option and will cost consumers more – this is critical national infrastructure. The sooner we build the network we need, and invest to strengthen our resilience, the lower the cost for bill payers will be in the future. 

This critical investment covering upgrade and expansion of the electricity grid, maintenance and also gas depreciation in its entirety is estimated to increase network charges on bills by £104 by 2031. This includes £30 for the gas networks and £74 for the electricity grid. 

Around half of this investment, including £30 on gas networks, is needed for the gas and electricity grids to maintain safety, resilience, and reliability. 

The remainder, around £52, will be used to expand the capacity of the electricity grid to deal with the rising demands of a more electrified energy system, as we move away from gas. 

This investment (£52) alone is expected to lead to around £80 of savings for consumers by 2031 compared to not investing by reducing constraint costs (money paid to wind farms to switch off because the grid is unable to transmit their power output) and making better use of our clean renewable energy so we are not having to pay for expensive gas plants to serve demand. So bills are expected to be around £30 lower than they would have been had this investment in upgrading and expanding the electricity network not been made. 

Taken all together the net cost of these investments on bills amounts to around £24 a year, or less than 40p per week, by March 2031, although this does not take into account the overall benefits of reaching clean power that can reduce bills. 

The £30 increase in gas network charges on bills by 2031 would be necessary in all scenarios in order to maintain safety, resilience, and reliability in our gas networks. 

https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/press-release/ofgem-approves-initial-ps24-billion-operate-and-maintain-critical-gas-networks-and-upgrade-britains-electricity-supergrid

OFGEM say household electricity bills will rise by £74 a year, as a result of this £80 billion upgrade. That equated to £6.6 billion a year, given that non residential consumers use about 60% of total electricity. OFGEM say they are assuming return on capital of 6%, which implies depreciation costs of 2.5% over 40 years.

£6.6 billion works out at about £22/MWh, four times  NESO’s projection of just £5/MWh, which also includes constraint costs.

https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2024/12/13/milibands-300-energy-saving-is-smoke-mirrors/

But extraordinarily, the NESO Clean Power 2030 Report did not take grid upgrade costs into account. The report states:

Neither is there any costings for the upgrading of local distribution networks.

The figure it offer for “Grid expansion and constraint costs” only reflects the increase in constraint costs from £2.8 bn to £3.7 bn a year.

To the £80 billion mentioned, we can another £16 billion already spent or committed to by the National Grid between 2021 and 2026.

But the spending won’t stop in 2030. OFGEM note these current plans will cater for 126 GW of “clean” power, in line with NESO’s plans. But buildout of renewables will still need pursued rapidly.

The BBC reported a year ago that another £58bn is for work needed between 2030 and 2035.

Add the lot up and you are looking at £154 billion, which will add £13 billion to our bills each year. None of this expenditure would be needed without the expansion of renewable energy and the increased demand for electricity necessitated by Net Zero.

In true Orwellian double speak, OFGEM’s Jonathan Brearley tells us that spending £100 billion of your money will make you better off!

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July 13, 2025 at 08:16AM