Overview
- The Nature study finds the storm-track center has moved about 0.067 degrees of latitude per year since 1979 using a sea-level-pressure metric.
- Authors Rei Chemke of the Weizmann Institute of Science and Janni Yuval of Google Research report the change exceeds natural variability and reflects climate change.
- The new pressure-based approach overcomes sparse historical ocean wind records to robustly detect the storm-track shift.
- Climate models generally project roughly a 2-degree latitude shift by century’s end, yet the observed trend indicates future changes may be larger unless models improve.
- The poleward drift implies more heat and moisture reaching Alaska, reduced ventilation for the U.S. Southwest, and cooler, drier conditions in the Pacific Northwest.