Climate Information for the Eastern United States and Atlantic Canada

Recent and Real-time Data to Help Track Regional Change

Climate Impacts and Outlook

The quarterly Gulf of Maine Region Climate Impacts and Outlook offers a snapshot of recent weather events and anomalies; regional weather impacts on ecosystems and economic sectors; and a forecast for the coming three months. Click on any tab in the dashboard, it will expand to show an associated selection of panes. (Click again and it will collapse). Click on any figure in a pane to view a full-sized version, and click again to reduce it.

Gulf of Maine Region

Dashboard

Recent and Real-Time Data and Resources

US Eastern Region

US National

Canada–Atlantic Region and National

• Precipitation from extreme events in the GOM region has increased 74 percent since 1958 (NOAA).
• Extreme weather already poses economic and ecological challenges, and these events are expected to grow more frequent in coming decades, with precipitation increasing 5-9 percent (IPCC 2013).

Credit: Sherry Godlewski

• By 2050, climate scientists project a more rapid increase of 2.5 to 3.5°C (4.5 to 6.3° F) in regional air temperature (IPCC 2013).
• Temperatures in the Gulf of Maine have risen much more in recent decades than many other coastal waters around the world, and a 2012 “heat wave” in sea surface temperatures had damaging economic impacts.

Projected Temperature Changes in the Gulf of Maine Region by the 2050s (°C.), reflecting the most recent IPCC models (Credit: Adam Fenech, UPEI Climate Lab)

What’s Climate Change and What’s Just the Weather?

This one-minute animation by Ole Christoffer Haga, produced by Teddy TV for the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation, clearly and humorously illustrates the difference between long-term climate trends and variable weather patterns.