Add my appreciation to your take on clouds, great stuff although you're clearly delving into the deep weeds of science and maybe overlooking simper realities that are being driven by significant changes that humans have made to the natural hydrological cycle particularly in the Arctic & subarctic regions. Maybe I missed that you have accounted for this? If not
what's your understanding about the huge proliferation of hydroelectric -large super dams constructed between 1950 to the mid 1980s I will suggest that most all of the major rivers from Siberia Russia to Northeastern Quebec Canada have been dammed, impounded, and permanently reservoired out of existence. So all this water that historically has been moving as major rivers is no longer and now all water is stored to sit stagnant in the sort Arctic & subarctic summer warming ,absorbing solar radiation, melting permafrost,etc.
Than only in the dead of winter, drawing water into the penstocks located in a water column behind the dams well below the frozen ice on top. here the water is 40 F + or- a degree or two
Waters head down the Penstock unfrozen into turbines the size of small homes and is the discharged into the severe winter cold,at huge velocities and volumes much much greater than former river flows. Can you imagine the huge temperature differential of this warm, so to speak water hitting air temps 0 to -30. Historically these rivers were frozen all winter. But now they flow unfrozen releasing water vapor invisible but seen to us as steam or arctic sea smoke.
Imagine huge clouds of methane rich steam rising around every on of these megadams all winter long. Now lets talk about what that water vapor is doing to the atmosphere. There are some great studies about effects of water vapor on cloud formation. According to NASA WV is a GHG that super intensifies the Greenhouse effects on EARTH. And the water vapor released in Northern Quebec follows the predominant winter winds blowing from the Southwest to the Northeast into southern edge of Greenland. Our research has shown a huge swing in temperature , humidity, and precipitation, way beyou historical normal range, this started to be recorded 1996 at weather stations in the southern end of the Greenland glaciers. This was the beginning of a tipping point there for feedbacks and Polar Amplification. Hope that we can talk about this in regards to clouds/Climate change
Thanks, Cliff. This is really interesting. I don't know anything about the impacts of dammed Arctic/subarctic rivers on the region's climate and clouds. It's all beyond my reading, and unconnected to the specific stories I'm telling here. I was just making a small point in this clouds piece regarding what current research is suggesting about PSCs and their role in changes to polar climate.
There's so much I could have researched and then talked about re: clouds and climate. But this is a short piece rooted in personal experience rather than a comprehensive analysis.
There are some writers here on Substack really focused on the link between land changes and climate. Alpha Lo and Rob Lewis come to mind especially. If you're not reading them already, you might find them interesting. I don't know that I've noticed them talking about the Arctic context as you do here, so they may be interested in what you have to offer.
Looks like you're a Mainer too. I'm from Parsonsfield Maine West of Portland on the NH line, Yea Alpha , Rob and I are already in communications and are sharing.
Here is another concept to think about:
OUR EARTH IS SIMILAR TO A LIVING BEING:
Our Biological Systems Seem to Exist On A Planetary Scale
Notes: The human race has talked about the Gaia Principal ,indigenous peoples experienced our planet as a living being. Earths’ complexity is not so different then most Animals. As a matter of fact, if you look closely, our planet shares similar biologically functional systems, and why should we look further and come to respect this reality? ??
Of course on a planetary level all systems are supersized. Let's think about the possible functional systems of our planet. I will suggest that the oceans serve as the Earths heart, and with a cardiovascular interconnectedness with The main rivers of the planet, which in turn provide blood flow and are the main nutrient delivery system coming from terrestrial areas, the Land, or physical Body, which also provides food, clothing, and a home for all life on land, water, and sky. The lungs of the planet, its respiratory system is our atmosphere our air. The metabolic and digestive systems are under our feet, The dirt / ground we walk.
And often in the air we breath. Decomposition leads to more fertile ground for more growth and the cycle continues.
Rivers are like the the coronary arteries of a human being — carrying essential nutrients to our oceans and marine life, Just as our circulatory system carries essential nutrients throughout our bodies, blockages in a human body can create a grave illness, damming the rivers of our Earth creates blockages that cause serious problems for the entire planet. Our planet now has a fever. DAMS have interrupted centuries-old hydrological flow cycles. This has biogeochemically transformed the oceans.
The planet is no longer capable of providing enough essential nutrients, to support some of its natural immune systems. And starvation with decreases of diatom Phytoplankton forests along the oceans continental shelfs , along with the negative impacts of what remains of our land forests , now presents a major problem for sequestering Co2. This is altering life and Climate as we have come to know on our planet. Hans Neu One of the most prolific researchers and head of Oceanography at the Bedford Institute in N.S. from 1960s to 80s,
Said,” Even if there were no scientific proof available to verify the danger of such damming modifications, logic alone would show that seasonal regulation forced onto river flow ignores the natural consequences of fresh water discharges.”
Thanks for writing this, Jason. Love the perspective. So true — planetary boundaries is an integral concept for audiences everywhere and can add context to so many of today's ecological issues. Absolutely tickled at 'a data center pretending to be a cloud'.
Thank you, Devayani. I do wish the boundaries concept was taught at all grade levels, though it would take some good science communicators to reframe some of the concepts. We need that perspective across generations and cultures.
I am a ‘cloud child’ from way back. And still obsessed with everything from odd shapes with stories to be scripted, to the incredible undercasts here in the Green Mtns of VT. And as you have photographed, the lenticular clouds that are often blanketing and folding themselves over our highest peak, Mt. Mansfield.
“Named for mother-of-pearl (nacre), nacreous clouds are intensely iridescent and silky”
How incredible to witness. I wonder, I have mentioned before, about our seasonal camp in the NEK of VT, just shy of the Canadian border.
Camp just about hangs over the water and faces west, our sunsets are often hard to describe. Various synonyms of amazing. It seems I might have seen nacreous clouds in late October. Is that possible? Thank you for the education, it is a sobering lesson, and a wonderful piece of writing. I’m surprised you didn’t include this, so I will… (I’m sure Heather can finish the rest of the lyrics with her lovely voice😊)
Thanks for the Joni Mitchell, Lor. We can never have too much of her.
I don't know for sure, but nacreous clouds are always described as a polar phenomena. It's possible what you saw was uncommon iridescence in more typical clouds. This site has a very brief write-up: https://scijinks.gov/rainbow-clouds/.
I'm glad I put this piece together, bc it has me back looking at clouds more often now.
Hey Jason! I’m new to Substack and just came across your profile (thank you, mysterious algorithm), and I’m already enchanted! Your writing has this poetic touch that somehow makes even a heavy topic like planetary boundaries feel almost soothing to read, haha. I’m Brazilian, and last year, a study revealed how deforestation in the Amazon is drying up the "flying rivers", those invisible streams of moisture that travel through the air, creating clouds thousands of kilometers away. It’s almost magical. Yet, as the rains diminish, it’s not just the forests that suffer. It’s the hydroelectric dams, the crops in dry regions, and ironically, the very agribusiness that often turns a blind eye to the environment. It’s strange, really, how we sometimes disconnect from the bigger picture, what a brilliant Brazilian quilombola writer once called “cosmophobia.” We end up unraveling the threads that hold everything together, even the ones tied to our own survival. Anyway, thank you for your words. You’ve got a new reader here!
Hi Ananda, and welcome to the Field Guide. Thank you for your kind words. I'm happy to have you here, especially if you're (almost) soothed by my description of planetary boundaries... I'm fascinated by this idea of cosmophobia, so thanks also for that.
Your description of the changes to the magic of the Amazon is both beautiful and heartbreaking. If you want to read deeper here on Substack on the link between deforestation and climate, check out Alpha Lo's Climate Water Project, Rob Lewis' Climate According to Life, and Anastassia Makarieva's Biotic Regulation and Biotic Pump.
It's actually an interesting concept, I checked and apparently there’s no English translation of the book I mentioned (maybe I should do that, haha) so I’ll share the part where he explains the term “cosmophobia”:
“While society is built with those who are alike, community is built with those who are diverse. We are the diverse ones, the cosmological, the natural, the organic. We are not humanists—humanists are those who turn nature into money, into the latest car model.
We are all cosmos, except for humans. I am not human; I am quilombola. I am a farmer, a fisherman, an entity of the cosmos. Humans are the Euro-Christian monotheists. They fear the cosmos. Cosmophobia is humanity’s great disease.” (Antônio Bispo)
Thank you for the recommendations, I’m now following all of them (I just knew Rob beforehand) and found a safe space for absorbing information and reflections!
This is lovely, Ananda. Thank you. I like the reminder that humanists put humans on an isolated pedestal, but I especially appreciate the sophisticated yet ancient idea of community embedded in his definition of cosmos. And I'm struck by his idea that the much-vaunted global idea of "human" is part of the problem, because really we're a primate who lives in local community.
I'm reminded (as I so often am) of a bit of wisdom from the book Ishmael. Much of what ails us is the modern civilizational idea that the world belongs to us, while the only path forward is to remember that we belong to the world.
I'm minded again of why I've supported and admired you for so long. Not because we share so many interests: you on the AT/me on the PCT You in Antarctica/me in the desert. Me with a lifelong love of clouds and even a small pile of books on them (my favorites are virga, lenticulars, noctilucent- but I love them all)/you amazingly likewise...the list does go on. But my deepest admiration is because we share a similar compassion for all life and a desire to heal the wounded world and its occupants- and you act far more effectively in that vocation than I. We are not unique in that last common pursuit. Many share it. Compassion for all life even in its varied forms although there are species and individuals who do harm to others. Attempt to shine on them all.
Hi Michael, it's such a pleasure to have you on the other end of all this scribbling, and as you say it's not just about the similar interests. Thank you, as always, for the depth of your thinking and feeling. I did think of you as I decided to include the quote from The Cloud of Unknowing. I figured you'd be one of the few readers who knew the reference. (Not that I know it well; I looked into it long ago when I was writing about clouds.)
Yes I actually corresponded with the translator of one of the well known editions of The Cloud of Unknowing. As to clouds in general I was given a book, The Book of the Sky sixty some years ago. About 40 years later I gifted a trade paperback of cloud photographs to a wealthy family friend. She was a senior in the stock trading Edwards family. My self given Pawnee name is Titiwatirawahut, which roughly translates as "Walks-looking-to-Heaven" from my Pawnee step-mother. I later carved that name with very small letters into a gatepost at my home monastery Songkwangsa. Some very interesting places and people I've been and met and sky and clouds were a common thread throughout. My email is as you know and there cannot be a horizon without a sky above it and I've been running almost my whole life.
That's a long and beautiful relationship with the sky and clouds, Michael. It's good for me to hear about your parallel life, about someone else paying attention to the eternal spaces.
Jason, I have such immense gratitude for the poetic fervour with which you document and describe the astonishing beauty of the natural world and the alarming consequences of modernity’s steady encroachment on everything natural. As we go through living in these times where most people seem deeply oblivious to the extent of ecological harm & destruction, voices like yours are so precious and necessary. You remind us that no matter how terrifying it gets, there is still always beauty to be found. Thank you.
Thank you, Jayasree. That's very kind of you to say. I'm so glad you're hearing what I'm intending to say. And yes, beauty (and some good news too) amid the losses. Perhaps more focus on the former will help reduce the latter, but only if we acknowledge both, I think.
Add my appreciation to your take on clouds, great stuff although you're clearly delving into the deep weeds of science and maybe overlooking simper realities that are being driven by significant changes that humans have made to the natural hydrological cycle particularly in the Arctic & subarctic regions. Maybe I missed that you have accounted for this? If not
what's your understanding about the huge proliferation of hydroelectric -large super dams constructed between 1950 to the mid 1980s I will suggest that most all of the major rivers from Siberia Russia to Northeastern Quebec Canada have been dammed, impounded, and permanently reservoired out of existence. So all this water that historically has been moving as major rivers is no longer and now all water is stored to sit stagnant in the sort Arctic & subarctic summer warming ,absorbing solar radiation, melting permafrost,etc.
Than only in the dead of winter, drawing water into the penstocks located in a water column behind the dams well below the frozen ice on top. here the water is 40 F + or- a degree or two
Waters head down the Penstock unfrozen into turbines the size of small homes and is the discharged into the severe winter cold,at huge velocities and volumes much much greater than former river flows. Can you imagine the huge temperature differential of this warm, so to speak water hitting air temps 0 to -30. Historically these rivers were frozen all winter. But now they flow unfrozen releasing water vapor invisible but seen to us as steam or arctic sea smoke.
Imagine huge clouds of methane rich steam rising around every on of these megadams all winter long. Now lets talk about what that water vapor is doing to the atmosphere. There are some great studies about effects of water vapor on cloud formation. According to NASA WV is a GHG that super intensifies the Greenhouse effects on EARTH. And the water vapor released in Northern Quebec follows the predominant winter winds blowing from the Southwest to the Northeast into southern edge of Greenland. Our research has shown a huge swing in temperature , humidity, and precipitation, way beyou historical normal range, this started to be recorded 1996 at weather stations in the southern end of the Greenland glaciers. This was the beginning of a tipping point there for feedbacks and Polar Amplification. Hope that we can talk about this in regards to clouds/Climate change
Thanks, Cliff. This is really interesting. I don't know anything about the impacts of dammed Arctic/subarctic rivers on the region's climate and clouds. It's all beyond my reading, and unconnected to the specific stories I'm telling here. I was just making a small point in this clouds piece regarding what current research is suggesting about PSCs and their role in changes to polar climate.
There's so much I could have researched and then talked about re: clouds and climate. But this is a short piece rooted in personal experience rather than a comprehensive analysis.
There are some writers here on Substack really focused on the link between land changes and climate. Alpha Lo and Rob Lewis come to mind especially. If you're not reading them already, you might find them interesting. I don't know that I've noticed them talking about the Arctic context as you do here, so they may be interested in what you have to offer.
Thanks very much for the comment.
Hello Jason,
Looks like you're a Mainer too. I'm from Parsonsfield Maine West of Portland on the NH line, Yea Alpha , Rob and I are already in communications and are sharing.
Here is another concept to think about:
OUR EARTH IS SIMILAR TO A LIVING BEING:
Our Biological Systems Seem to Exist On A Planetary Scale
Notes: The human race has talked about the Gaia Principal ,indigenous peoples experienced our planet as a living being. Earths’ complexity is not so different then most Animals. As a matter of fact, if you look closely, our planet shares similar biologically functional systems, and why should we look further and come to respect this reality? ??
Of course on a planetary level all systems are supersized. Let's think about the possible functional systems of our planet. I will suggest that the oceans serve as the Earths heart, and with a cardiovascular interconnectedness with The main rivers of the planet, which in turn provide blood flow and are the main nutrient delivery system coming from terrestrial areas, the Land, or physical Body, which also provides food, clothing, and a home for all life on land, water, and sky. The lungs of the planet, its respiratory system is our atmosphere our air. The metabolic and digestive systems are under our feet, The dirt / ground we walk.
And often in the air we breath. Decomposition leads to more fertile ground for more growth and the cycle continues.
Rivers are like the the coronary arteries of a human being — carrying essential nutrients to our oceans and marine life, Just as our circulatory system carries essential nutrients throughout our bodies, blockages in a human body can create a grave illness, damming the rivers of our Earth creates blockages that cause serious problems for the entire planet. Our planet now has a fever. DAMS have interrupted centuries-old hydrological flow cycles. This has biogeochemically transformed the oceans.
The planet is no longer capable of providing enough essential nutrients, to support some of its natural immune systems. And starvation with decreases of diatom Phytoplankton forests along the oceans continental shelfs , along with the negative impacts of what remains of our land forests , now presents a major problem for sequestering Co2. This is altering life and Climate as we have come to know on our planet. Hans Neu One of the most prolific researchers and head of Oceanography at the Bedford Institute in N.S. from 1960s to 80s,
Said,” Even if there were no scientific proof available to verify the danger of such damming modifications, logic alone would show that seasonal regulation forced onto river flow ignores the natural consequences of fresh water discharges.”
Thanks for writing this, Jason. Love the perspective. So true — planetary boundaries is an integral concept for audiences everywhere and can add context to so many of today's ecological issues. Absolutely tickled at 'a data center pretending to be a cloud'.
Thank you, Devayani. I do wish the boundaries concept was taught at all grade levels, though it would take some good science communicators to reframe some of the concepts. We need that perspective across generations and cultures.
Since you can’t get enough of Joni Mitchell, when you get some quiet time, settle in with Heather, to listen to my favorite rendition;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKQSlH-LLTQ
I am a ‘cloud child’ from way back. And still obsessed with everything from odd shapes with stories to be scripted, to the incredible undercasts here in the Green Mtns of VT. And as you have photographed, the lenticular clouds that are often blanketing and folding themselves over our highest peak, Mt. Mansfield.
“Named for mother-of-pearl (nacre), nacreous clouds are intensely iridescent and silky”
How incredible to witness. I wonder, I have mentioned before, about our seasonal camp in the NEK of VT, just shy of the Canadian border.
Camp just about hangs over the water and faces west, our sunsets are often hard to describe. Various synonyms of amazing. It seems I might have seen nacreous clouds in late October. Is that possible? Thank you for the education, it is a sobering lesson, and a wonderful piece of writing. I’m surprised you didn’t include this, so I will… (I’m sure Heather can finish the rest of the lyrics with her lovely voice😊)
Joni Mitchell- Both Sides Now
“Rows and floes of angel hair
And ice cream castles in the air
And feather canyons everywhere
Looked at clouds that way
But now they only block the sun
They rain and they snow on everyone
So many things I would have done
But clouds got in my way
I've looked at clouds from both sides now
From up and down and still somehow
It's cloud illusions I recall
I really don't know clouds at all…”
Thanks for the Joni Mitchell, Lor. We can never have too much of her.
I don't know for sure, but nacreous clouds are always described as a polar phenomena. It's possible what you saw was uncommon iridescence in more typical clouds. This site has a very brief write-up: https://scijinks.gov/rainbow-clouds/.
I'm glad I put this piece together, bc it has me back looking at clouds more often now.
Unknowable, wild,
the more-than-human real world.
Learn about/from clouds.
Hey Jason! I’m new to Substack and just came across your profile (thank you, mysterious algorithm), and I’m already enchanted! Your writing has this poetic touch that somehow makes even a heavy topic like planetary boundaries feel almost soothing to read, haha. I’m Brazilian, and last year, a study revealed how deforestation in the Amazon is drying up the "flying rivers", those invisible streams of moisture that travel through the air, creating clouds thousands of kilometers away. It’s almost magical. Yet, as the rains diminish, it’s not just the forests that suffer. It’s the hydroelectric dams, the crops in dry regions, and ironically, the very agribusiness that often turns a blind eye to the environment. It’s strange, really, how we sometimes disconnect from the bigger picture, what a brilliant Brazilian quilombola writer once called “cosmophobia.” We end up unraveling the threads that hold everything together, even the ones tied to our own survival. Anyway, thank you for your words. You’ve got a new reader here!
Hi Ananda, and welcome to the Field Guide. Thank you for your kind words. I'm happy to have you here, especially if you're (almost) soothed by my description of planetary boundaries... I'm fascinated by this idea of cosmophobia, so thanks also for that.
Your description of the changes to the magic of the Amazon is both beautiful and heartbreaking. If you want to read deeper here on Substack on the link between deforestation and climate, check out Alpha Lo's Climate Water Project, Rob Lewis' Climate According to Life, and Anastassia Makarieva's Biotic Regulation and Biotic Pump.
It's actually an interesting concept, I checked and apparently there’s no English translation of the book I mentioned (maybe I should do that, haha) so I’ll share the part where he explains the term “cosmophobia”:
“While society is built with those who are alike, community is built with those who are diverse. We are the diverse ones, the cosmological, the natural, the organic. We are not humanists—humanists are those who turn nature into money, into the latest car model.
We are all cosmos, except for humans. I am not human; I am quilombola. I am a farmer, a fisherman, an entity of the cosmos. Humans are the Euro-Christian monotheists. They fear the cosmos. Cosmophobia is humanity’s great disease.” (Antônio Bispo)
Thank you for the recommendations, I’m now following all of them (I just knew Rob beforehand) and found a safe space for absorbing information and reflections!
This is lovely, Ananda. Thank you. I like the reminder that humanists put humans on an isolated pedestal, but I especially appreciate the sophisticated yet ancient idea of community embedded in his definition of cosmos. And I'm struck by his idea that the much-vaunted global idea of "human" is part of the problem, because really we're a primate who lives in local community.
I'm reminded (as I so often am) of a bit of wisdom from the book Ishmael. Much of what ails us is the modern civilizational idea that the world belongs to us, while the only path forward is to remember that we belong to the world.
Let me know when you publish your translation...
I'm minded again of why I've supported and admired you for so long. Not because we share so many interests: you on the AT/me on the PCT You in Antarctica/me in the desert. Me with a lifelong love of clouds and even a small pile of books on them (my favorites are virga, lenticulars, noctilucent- but I love them all)/you amazingly likewise...the list does go on. But my deepest admiration is because we share a similar compassion for all life and a desire to heal the wounded world and its occupants- and you act far more effectively in that vocation than I. We are not unique in that last common pursuit. Many share it. Compassion for all life even in its varied forms although there are species and individuals who do harm to others. Attempt to shine on them all.
My favorite is cirrus.
Hi Michael, it's such a pleasure to have you on the other end of all this scribbling, and as you say it's not just about the similar interests. Thank you, as always, for the depth of your thinking and feeling. I did think of you as I decided to include the quote from The Cloud of Unknowing. I figured you'd be one of the few readers who knew the reference. (Not that I know it well; I looked into it long ago when I was writing about clouds.)
Yes I actually corresponded with the translator of one of the well known editions of The Cloud of Unknowing. As to clouds in general I was given a book, The Book of the Sky sixty some years ago. About 40 years later I gifted a trade paperback of cloud photographs to a wealthy family friend. She was a senior in the stock trading Edwards family. My self given Pawnee name is Titiwatirawahut, which roughly translates as "Walks-looking-to-Heaven" from my Pawnee step-mother. I later carved that name with very small letters into a gatepost at my home monastery Songkwangsa. Some very interesting places and people I've been and met and sky and clouds were a common thread throughout. My email is as you know and there cannot be a horizon without a sky above it and I've been running almost my whole life.
That's a long and beautiful relationship with the sky and clouds, Michael. It's good for me to hear about your parallel life, about someone else paying attention to the eternal spaces.
Jason, I have such immense gratitude for the poetic fervour with which you document and describe the astonishing beauty of the natural world and the alarming consequences of modernity’s steady encroachment on everything natural. As we go through living in these times where most people seem deeply oblivious to the extent of ecological harm & destruction, voices like yours are so precious and necessary. You remind us that no matter how terrifying it gets, there is still always beauty to be found. Thank you.
So nice to see you here Jayasree. Jason is an old soul indeed and one of the best writers in Substack, not excluding your good self.
Thank you, Jayasree. That's very kind of you to say. I'm so glad you're hearing what I'm intending to say. And yes, beauty (and some good news too) amid the losses. Perhaps more focus on the former will help reduce the latter, but only if we acknowledge both, I think.