by Daniel Brouse Rerouting the Walker Circulation: The Pacific El Niño–Atlantic Niña Atmospheric Bridge The unusual co-occurrence of a Pacific El Niño and an Atlantic Niña illustrates how strongly connected Earth’s climate system is. Although the Pacific and Atlantic are separate ocean basins, the atmosphere links them through planetary-scale circulation patterns. One of the most […]
Category Archives: Science
How Is Climate Energy Hitting You? Sudan’s Manmade Feedbacks
by Daniel Brouse Sudan: Hydroclimatic Whiplash and the Socio-Economic Feedback Loop Sudan is experiencing more than a succession of extreme weather events. It is experiencing a coupled climate, ecological, and socioeconomic crisis in which each shock weakens the systems needed to absorb the next one. Extreme heat increases water demand and accelerates soil and vegetation […]
How Is Climate Energy Hitting You? The Grand Canyon
The Grand Canyon Flash Flood Tragedy By Daniel Brouse A devastating flash flood on August 29, 2026, tore through Grand Canyon National Park, leaving one person dead and approximately 15 people missing or unaccounted for. The disaster struck around 2:30 p.m. following intense rainfall on the Kaibab Plateau. Up to an inch of rain fell […]
See 1.5°C in Action: The Nepal–Tibet Glacial Collapse
by Daniel Brouse The permafrost tipping point—and its feedbacks with other tipping points—is the most interesting part to me. Permafrost was kind of the glue holding everything together… until 1.5°C. Then the coupled feedbacks start feeding each other, and the whole system begins to unravel. And the mountains crumble to the sea… see? 😉 The […]
HOW IS CLIMATE ENERGY HITTING YOU? The Backyard Experiments
The Backyard Experiments: Hydroclimatic Whiplash, Soil Degradation, Insect Decline, and Ecosystem Collapse By Daniel Brouse Have You Looked Out Your Back Door for Climate Change? It’s there. I noticed an interesting phenomenon: an increase in dead earthworms and millipedes in the swimming pool. It turns out this is connected to opposite extremes of a coupled […]
How Is Climate Energy Hitting You? Millipedes Get Their Marching Orders
by Daniel Brouse Why are millipedes showing up dead at the bottom of the swimming pool? The answer may seem strange at first: extreme weather is changing the moisture dynamics of the tiny ecosystem around your home. Earlier this summer, I wrote about earthworms turning up dead in the pool. Their appearance followed intense rainfall […]
How Is Climate Energy Hitting You? Fluidization Physics
by Daniel Brouse How Potential Energy Becomes Kinetic Energy—and How a Falling Mass Can Become Fluidized Rocky Rex said, “The ice mass (or composite) came out of a hanging valley that contained a cirque, possibly starting to move as a rotational slump. So there’s a lot of potential energy right at the start of the […]
How Is Climate Energy Hitting You? Like Humans Throwing Stones
by Daniel Brouse The Climate Physics Behind the Nepal-Tibet Collapse “Warming of Nepal’s glaciers has been a continuous process over this timescale and is not something that has only occurred recently due to human activity.” This statement is misleading and, as a description of the modern climate system, demonstrably wrong. Yes, Himalayan glaciers have always […]
How Is Climate Energy Hitting You? A: Like Wet Concrete
by Daniel Brouse How Is Climate Energy Hitting You Nepal-Tibet? A: Like Wet Concrete (Fluidize Physics) Heat melts ice. Meltwater changes friction. Water infiltrates soil. Pore pressure rises. Permafrost thaws. Slopes weaken. Glaciers destabilize. Gravity converts elevation into kinetic energy. Moving water entrains sediment. Sediment increases density. Increasing density increases the potential force of the […]
How Is Climate Energy Hitting You? The Domino Effect
by Daniel Brouse Introduction A glacial collapse is a powerful example of how climate change can turn one tipping point into a cascading chain of failures—the domino effect. The first domino is literal: an enormous mass of ice, rock, snow, and sediment breaks loose and cascades down the mountainside in a massive avalanche or landslide. […]