Let’s take a look at the differences between La Nina and El Nino
El Nino
El Nino is Spanish for the boy
It’s the Warm phase, characterised by warm ocean water with a Southern oscillation over the east central equatorial Pacific Ocean.
El Niño is usually defined as:
Reduced rainfall
Warmer temperatures
Shift in temperature extremes
Increased frost risk
Reduced tropical cyclone numbers
Later monsoon onset
Increased fire danger in southeast Australia
Decreased alpine snow depths
La Nina
La Nina is Spanish for the girl
It’s the Cool phase characterised by lower sea temperatures across the eastern, equatorial and central Pacific Ocean. They usually occur every few years.
La Niña typically means:
Increased rainfall across much of Australia
Cooler daytime temperatures (south of the tropics)
Warmer overnight temperatures (in the north)
Shift in temperature extremes
Decreased frost risk
Greater tropical cyclone numbers
Earlier monsoon onset
Both cause global changes in temperature and rainfall. Both effect predominately developing nations and their agriculture and fishing bordering the Pacific Ocean.
The neutral phase:
In the neutral state (neither El Niño nor La Niña) trade winds blow east to west across the surface of the tropical Pacific Ocean, bringing warm moist air and warmer surface waters towards the western Pacific and keeping the central Pacific Ocean relatively cool.
Questions to consider for further research are:
Are we responsible for changes in Global weather patterns?
Are there changes or weather events that are due to human activity?
The Impact on Climate Change?
What effect will reducing carbon emissions make?
Will planting more trees help?
Wind/Solar/Hydro/Battery power, which will serve us in the future?
We can make changes:
Recycling is more common nowadays and we are lucky in this era to have people constantly working on new methods to reduce waste and reuse or upcycle products and give them a new life.
Choose sustainable products over single use disposable products.
Can you Reduce your reliance on plastic in everyday use? Sadly the soft plastic recycling project has been paused in Australia. Projects for Cleaning up the plastic in oceans are Sea Bin, 4Ocean, Greenpeace… Get involved in your local Clean Up Australia Day.
We can Reduce chemical usage in cleaning products and personal care products thereby reducing indoor air toxicity and environmental poisoning
Buy quality clothing over fast fashion.
Climate change continues to influence Australian and global climates. Australia's climate has warmed by around 1.47 °C in the period 1910–2021. That’s a scary fact!
Currently in Australia we are in the La Nina phase with increased cloud cover and increased rainfall resulting in record flood levels.
And the result is loss of life, loss of crops and livestock, loss of homes and loss of livelihoods.
Right now “over the ditch” New Zealand is suffering severe floods.
The significant impacts that La Niña and El Niño can have across Australia and the wider globe highlight the importance of forecasting these events for government, agriculture, businesses and communities.
If everyone’s attitude is “I am only one person, my changes are not going to have an impact”… where will that leave the planet for future generations?
It is possible for one to become many and force changes in our daily habits.
What we do now affects the planet and its survival for future generations.
For more tips on living sustainably you may like to follow me on link.tree: https://linktr.ee/margaretkin
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