Environment Canada is predicting a warm summer across the country, especially in the East

Environment Canada is predicting a warmer-than-usual summer across the country, with the highest chance of high temperatures everywhere east of Manitoba.

“There is a high probability of above normal temperatures for the summer season,” said meteorologist Jennifer Smith. “Above normal temperatures are expected for the Prairies, but the likelihood is not as high as in the east.”

The government agency released maps Tuesday that suggest the chance of a hot summer is nearly 100 percent almost everywhere east of the Ontario-Manitoba border. This probability drops to 50% in Alberta.

Coastal British Columbia and the Yukon are the only parts of Canada where normal temperatures are forecast.

Still, the usual weather of a Canadian summer is expected – that is, a little bit of everything.

“Daily weather will vary,” Smith said. “Expect heat waves, cool spells and all the ups and downs that summer brings.”

No such simple model is presented for precipitation.

“Climate models are not capable of making reliable predictions,” Smith said. “There is no clear signal.”

Predicting precipitation is much more difficult than precipitation, said Smith, who compared long-range rain forecasts to trying to predict where individual milk particles go when you drop them into a cup of coffee.

“The science is there, but the ability to measure what’s happening in the atmosphere everywhere at any time is not.”

These higher temperatures will have an effect on wildfires. The heat will dry out the soil, and mountain snowpacks are already melting earlier in the year than before.

“Our colleagues at (Natural Resources Canada) are predicting an increased wildfire risk for central Canada in the latter part of the summer,” said Environment Canada climatologist Nathan Gillett.

The department plans to offer new products this summer.

A website called FireWork, which is expected to be up and running by the end of next month, would identify the sources of the smoke and predict where it will move over the next three days. It would be accompanied by an advisory scale describing the severity of the threat.

Users could set it to issue a warning when smoke levels exceed any threshold they deem safe or comfortable.

The agency is also developing a rapid response climate change attribution system that would allow scientists to calculate the likely contribution of climate change to any extreme weather event.

For example, last spring’s heat wave in Alberta, which saw temperatures in excess of 30C when the average is about 18C, was at least twice as likely to be influenced by climate change.

Gillett said the information would allow officials to target their response to such events. If you’re rebuilding a bridge, he said, it’s useful to know whether climate change has played a role or whether it’s natural variability.

Gillett said the climate is already taking effect. Temperatures have been rising since 1948, he said.

“Warming was seen from coast to coast in the summer,” he said. “Human-induced warming explains almost all of the observed warming.

“Climate change signal on warming in Canada is clear”.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published on June 11, 2024.

Bob Weber, Canadian Press