Sunshine levels 2013

[Aaron]

It's being a pretty dull month here as Aaron has alluded to although the coming week does look a little sunnier than the norm.

To be honest, I was hoping for a really cloudy, dry month, just for statistical interest, but it doesn't look likely now with snow melt probably accounting for more than 10mm today alone. Oh well.

[summer blizzard]

That would break the record by a considerable margin, although for only since 2003, for the sunniest year ever in Buxton, Derbyshire. Even if March saw no sun at all in Aberdeen then it's possible you still wouldn't drop below our record sunniest (1248 hours), depending on just how sunny that March was.

I've found that compared to the Peak District/Pennines/North-West England, the West of Scotland gets a lot of bad weather but it also gets a lot of good weather, and blue sky never seems to be far away. Not a very scientific description, I admit.

It's likely because western Scotland is commonly in a showery maritime flow and in late spring an easterly flow..

[Guest pjl20101]

According to the Philip Eden site this is the amount of sunshine we have had so far this year: http://climate-uk.com/

Interesting

[Terminal Moraine]

It's certainly not as sunless as January 1996 in this area. I recorded 22 hours of sunshine between the 9th and 16th, with no sunless days in that period. It has been very cloudy during the cold spell though with sunshine on just 2 days since the 17th, amounting to just under 7 hours.

[Thundery wintry showers]

It's rivalling January 1996 for dullness round these parts; yesterday we saw the sun for about half an hour in the afternoon which was the first for around 10 days. A brief clearance overnight saw a drop to -4C, the lowest of this spell, but it was up to -1 and cloudy again at sunrise.

I've been wondering what this spell would have brought had it occurred during the 1997-2007 period; I reckon we would have seen temps of +1 to +3 day and night with rain and sleet, and no lying snow beneath 300m. Since the late 2000s step change its been just cold enough to give and maintain lying snow to low levels, despite the lack of low minima.

I think there's certainly been a shift towards more extensive high-latitude blocking in recent cold spells, more than offsetting the issue that our airmasses are gradually getting warmer.

During the "easterly" second half of January 1996 for instance, the 850hPa temperature was mostly above -5C, primarily because high pressure was mostly centred over S and E Scandinavia and brought relatively mild upper air in from the Balkans, except between the 25th and 27th when high pressure ridged across to the north and brought a cold snowy easterly.

During the recent spell, 850hPa temperatures have mostly been below -5C, although still generally not cold enough to provide much instability over the North Sea.

January 1996 was really exceptional for its lack of sunshine in the Tyne and Wear/Durham area (as was March 1996- interestingly the two months sandwiched quite a sunny February). There were only 8 hours of sunshine at Durham during January 1996 and at Tynemouth there were only 5 hours, 3 of which were on the 28th.

[UV-RAY]

It's been a fairly sunless 12 months around these parts, and the last few months have been a nightmare for anyone suffering from S.A.D. Hopefully this year gives us something more to be cheerful about, but this is Blighty so I won't be holding my breath.

[AderynCoch]

9.2 hours so far in Bala.

[Aaron]

21.4 hours - a great start.

[sundog]

Its been very cloudy overall so far this year ive lost count how many cloudy days we have had. Winter is my fav season but day after day of dull cloudy weather is depressing to say the least. Taking the last 12 months as a whole there has been a distinct lack of sunshine i hope that changes in the near future. Another dull depressing day outside as i type!

[AderynCoch]

9.2 hours so far in Bala.

Finished on 9.8 hours.

[Terminal Moraine]

Finished on 9.8 hours.

How much is that total due to the surrounding mountains cutting out the sunshine at this time of year?

[Aaron]

How much is that total due to the surrounding mountains cutting out the sunshine at this time of year?

Similar problems arise at Eskdalemuir.

[Polar Maritime]

Just over 7 hours of sunshine yesterday here.

[marksp]

sunshine, subject close to my heart, and wallet. Had pv panels installed in Nov 11.

don,t measure sunshine totals but keep a record of kw produced, and the last 2 to 4 weeks have been dire,

[Terminal Moraine]

6.7 hrs of sunshine here yesterday but the moor to the west cuts out the last half hour of sunshine before sunset at this time of year, and around 50 minutes worth in summer.

[Aaron]

7.9 hours of sun today, 26.2 hours of sun over the past 4 days (including today), 55.7 hours for the month.

[reef]

It was sunny almost all day today here with 9.0hrs taking the total for the month so far to 61hrs, so we're already ahead of 2006, 2009, 2010 and 2011's final totals.

January was actually pretty average in this location despite the dull cold spell with 58 hours.

Edited February 18, 2013 by reef

[summer blizzard]

7.9 hours of sun today, 26.2 hours of sun over the past 4 days (including today), 55.7 hours for the month.

When was the last February to breach the 100 mark?

[Aaron]

When was the last February to breach the 100 mark?

Locally? I can't find an occurrence of such a thing, certainly not at Bradford which is the only station in the area to have freely available sunshine hours all the way back to 1908. Church Fenton had 97.7 hours in 2008 and Bradford had 98.9 hours. Church Fenton had one day missing, so I'm pretty sure it was sunnier than Bradford and probably exceeded 100 hours.

EDIT - after further digging around I can confirm that Church Fenton had 107.1 hours of sun in February 2008, but we need to hope that the upcoming spell of high pressure is not a cloudy one.

Edited February 18, 2013 by Aaron

[summer blizzard]

Locally? I can't find an occurrence of such a thing, certainly not at Bradford which is the only station in the area to have freely available sunshine hours all the way back to 1908. Church Fenton had 97.7 hours in 2008 and Bradford had 98.9 hours. Church Fenton had one day missing, so I'm pretty sure it was sunnier than Bradford.

I guess that's our target then.

[Aaron]

We're not far off 2008 levels, but as mentioned in my edited post, we need cloud to be at a minimum. We have less sunless days than February 2008, though (so far, at least).

Edited February 18, 2013 by Aaron

[reef]

2008 was exceptional here with 124 hours, which was more than June 2012.

Last February was quite sunny at 96 hours, but the 1981-2010 average is 80 hours, so pretty unremarkable.

[summer blizzard]

2008 was exceptional here with 124 hours, which was more than June 2012.

Last February was quite sunny at 96 hours, but the 1981-2010 average is 80 hours, so pretty unremarkable.

My memory of March must have overwhelmed any memories of sunshine last February.

[reef]

My memory of March must have overwhelmed any memories of sunshine last February.

December 2011 - March 2012 were all exceptionally sunny in this location and actually had a total higher than the entire summer:

Dec: 73hrs (140%)

Jan: 89hrs (156%)

Feb: 96hrs (120%)

Mar: 201hrs (179%)

Total: 459hrs (152%)

Summer 2012: 444hrs (78%)

In 2012 only summer was below average in the sunshine stakes, every other season was 110% or more. People generally base how sunny they think the year has been on the May-Sep period. The year as a whole was actually sunnier than average here but few could remember how sunny winter and early spring were.

Edited February 18, 2013 by reef

[Bottesford]

I remember how sunny last winter was - it was lovely and it seemed to be sunny almost all the time.

We had very few easterly dominated spells during winter/early spring hence why we, in our locations, saw such high sunshine totals.

More westerly driven weather seems to end up sunnier than average in our locations in the winter part of the year.

In summer the opposite seems to be true with westerlies bringing endless cloud and rain.