I have a question for you guys:
In the "Environmental Change Model" from Climate Reanalyzer, as Quebec gets substantially colder, its biomes shift from "Cool Conifer Forest" and "Forest-Tundra Transition" to "Moist Tundra-Alpine" and "Dry Tundra / Alpine" (-1C vs. 1979-2000). By -2C, "Dry Tundra / Alpine" takes over most of Quebec, as spots begin to glaciate, and by -3C, almost all of Quebec is glaciated.
https://climatereanalyzer.org/clim/ecm/My question for you all is, assuming 2018 is not a fluke, how many years of repeated summertime temperature anomalies of -2C or lower vs. 1979-2000 normals does it take to generate widespread biome destruction and displacement? I.E., how many cold summers where snow lasts for much longer than usual (or doesn't melt at all) does it take for the conifer forests to be destroyed?
My second question is, in what format does this destruction occur? When temps drop during summertime, does snow keep accumulating over the forest to the point where it is simply buried and turns to oil / etc underneath new glaciers? Or do the forests remain "visible" but dead, triggering very large fires (despite cooling) that further accelerate Greenland melt + additional cooling through carbon deposition and worsening meltwater runoff in the yr or two that follow?
I wonder if we may be looking at a looming ecological crisis, in Quebec in particular, beyond the ongoing global crisis?
My final note: it appears that the summer of 2018 was the coldest in Canada in the ESRL record with the exception of 1972 (another El Nino... coincidence?). The difference with 1972 vs. 2018 appears to be that 1) oceanic heat is much higher 2) Arctic heat is much higher 3) very cold summertime temps in Canada were INSUFFICIENT to upwell the massive reservoir of oceanic heat and balance the equation, as they apparently did in 1972, which means the reaction we are currently witnessing (++SWE) is more likely to continue in 2019 vs. whatever happened in the early 70s.
The other thing to note: in a direct 1972 to 2018 comparison, a very surprising area stands out as the only region with substantive negative departures. While parts of Canada have matched that year's cold, Greenland has exceeded it. It may be the case that 2018 has had Greenland's coldest summer in a very, very long while, even as the Arctic broiled to its warmest temperatures on record (overall) this year.