March 3 03:07 PM

The summer of 2012 will take off where last years ended, with the tendency toward cool over the Midwest. The very hot July last year forced temperatures to be well above normal as we saw in the south, and above normal elsewhere, but we did cool in August and September. This year, there is a much quicker demise of the La Nina with the reversal to the El Nino likely, as shown by the global models and in line with WeatherBELL overall ideas for the past year on this matter.  I expect the response to be muted compared to the last flip off a cold ENSO, 2009, and the forecast map is not as cold as 2009. Overall the nation is a pool of cool surrounded by a ring of warmth, not as extreme in dryness and heat as last year, but still warm for much of the nation.

Summer 2012

The forecasted temperature from the Plains east is 0.8 above normal, which means  population weighted about 10-15% more than normal cooling degree days, but I will have a better figure on that a bit later.

A look at the ideas behind this.

The ENSO is reversing and this is basically a glorified response to the overall colder signal that we have seen.

PDO

Global water temperatures:

There are three analogs off long running cold PDO, cold ENSO series with a warm AMO and a reversal to an El Nino we can look at; the summer of 1951, 1957, and 2009.  They give us this:

with precipitation that looks like this:

Notice it's dry again in Texas.

The daily CFS off the WeatherBELL site has been cool and wet for the summer:

There is great agreement on the dry south here overall.

Finally the JMA, which I really think is doing a great job, is showing a pool of cool in the Midwest:

The blend of all three led us to the idea of the forecast that leads this off.