IT SEEMS to happen with depressing frequency - sunny skies turn to rain just as the weekend arrives. Now Spanish researchers say they have evidence that in some parts of Europe the weather really does follow a weekly cycle, although not in the straightforward way that the anecdote might suggest.
IT SEEMS to happen with depressing frequency - sunny skies turn to rain just as the weekend arrives. Now Spanish researchers say they have evidence that in some parts of Europe the weather really does follow a weekly cycle, although not in the straightforward way that the anecdote might suggest.
Evidence has been mounting over the years that the weather in certain parts of the world, including the US, Japan and China, can be driven by the weekly cycle of human activity. This is because we tend to produce more air pollution during the week and less at the weekend. Evidence that such an effect occurs in Europe is controversial and has been harder to come by.
Arturo Sanchez-Lorenzo of the University of Barcelona, Spain, and his colleagues examined data gathered between 1961 and 2004 from weather stations across Spain to see whether such a pattern existed. They claim to have found it in Spain, as well as hints of weekly changes in air circulation more broadly over western Europe (Geophysical Research Letters, DOI: 10.1029/2008GL034160).
