Regional Climate Outlook

The Gulf of Maine Council’s Climate Network helps produce and distribute the Gulf of Maine Region Quarterly Climate Impacts and Outlook. Each season, US and Canadian scientists share data to provide this overview of the past season’s events and anomalies, and the weather’s impact on the region. Sign up here to receive the Gulf of Maine Region Quarterly Climate Impacts and Outlook every March, June, September and December. For more details, see the Climate Dashboard offering recent and real-time climate data for the northeast US and Atlantic Canada.

Click here to download the Spring 2017 Outlook (PDF, 1.2 MB)

Click here to download the Winter 2017 Outlook (PDF, 1 MB)

Past Climate Network Outlooks:

Click here to download the Fall 2016 Outlook (PDF, 1.3 MB)
Click here to download the Summer 2016 Outlook (PDF, 1.4 MB)
Click here to download the Spring 2016 Outlook (PDF, 1.4 MB)
Click here to download the Winter 2015-2016 Outlook (PDF, 1.1 MB)
Click here to download the December 2015 Outlook (PDF, 1.4 MB)
Click here to download the September 2015 Outlook (PDF, 1.3 MB)
Click here to download the June 2015 Outlook (PDF, 1.3 MB)
Click here to download the March 2015 Outlook (PDF, 1.4 MB)

Past Climate Network Bulletins:

Click here for the March Climate Network Bulletin (PDF, < 1 MB)
Click here for the September Climate Network Bulletin (PDF, < 1 MB)
Click here for the July Climate Network Bulletin (PDF, < 1 MB)

• 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.