⛷️ The Winter Olympics Are Warming

💻 Google’s AI Model Enhances Climate Modeling

Google’s open-source model, NeuralGCM, is a hybrid atmospheric model that merges machine learning capabilities with traditional physics to deliver quicker and more accurate weather and climate modeling. Precipitation forecasting is one of the most challenging aspects of global-scale weather and climate modeling, with uncertainties with timing, amounts, and location. NeuralGCM has demonstrated improved accuracy in reproducing average precipitation patterns, extreme rainfall events, and daily weather cycles, with a notable enhancement for the most severe 0.1% rainfall events. This hybrid model also works alongside some of Google’s other AI-only platforms like WeatherNext 2, extending analytical capabilities for extended-range weather and climate assessments. Across extended timescales spanning years to decades, NeuralGCM achieved an average mean error of less than 0.5mm per day, reducing error by 40% compared to leading global atmospheric models.

Tom Chapman, AI Magazine

⛷️ The Winter Olympics Are Warming

The Winter Olympics kick off on February 6, 2026 in Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, with the Paralympic Winter Games following a month later. It has been 70 years since Cortina d’Ampezzo first held the Winter Games, and February temperatures have warmed 6.4F (3.6C) since then. The area now sees 41 (19%) fewer days below freezing than when the Games were first held there in 1956. All of the other cities set to host the Winter Olympics since 1950 have also warmed, threatening the reliability, safety, and fairness of outdoor winter sports. A recent study found that out of 93 potential host sites, only 52 would have reliable conditions for the Winter Olympics by the 2050s. With the Paralympics being held in March, they face even greater risks with only 22 of the 93 potential host sites having climate-reliable conditions by the 2050s.

Climate Central

🌺 Early Spring Weather Outlooks

A few weather and climate forecasting entities have published early spring outlooks. NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center’s three month forecast for March, April, and May includes the potential for above normal temperatures for the southwestern, southern, southeastern, and northeastern regions of the United States, with equal chances of below or above normal temperatures for much of the Plains, Upper Midwest, and Northwest. Their seasonal precipitation outlook includes above normal precipitation chances for the Midwest and Great Lakes region, and below normal precipitation chances for the southwestern United States. AccuWeather issued an early spring outlook as well, stating they believe the transition to spring will occur faster in the southwestern U.S. and slower in the Great Lakes, Northeast, and far Northwest. For the spring season, they predict above normal temperatures for much of the western and southern U.S., with below normal temperatures expected in the northern tier of U.S. states.

Climate Prediction Center and Brian Lada, AccuWeather