Sustainable Community Solutions

I was thrilled to be back on my cross country skis this weekend for the first time since I broke my ankle skiing in a freak accident in the lower arb on December 4. The conditions were lovely on Saturday, and I just had to get out yesterday in spite of the ferociously low wind chill temps.

I did have the sense to wait until the warmest and least windy part of the day (still -7.7 degrees F and quite windy according to the Carleton weather station), just before dusk. I brought my camera and shot a few photos, including this one of a white tail deer bounding along a ridge with the Carleton wind turbine in the background.

While I was sitting by (and regularly stoking) the woodstove earlier in the day, a number of my friends (and my son Jakob’s high school friends) were up in Mora skiing the Vasaloppet in even more frigid conditions. Find out how they did in the searchable results ! (Hint: search the individual races for “Northfield” finishers.)

An aside: While there has been a fair amount of whining and moaning about the “cold, old-fashioned winter” we’ve been having this year, it’s worth noting that it has actually been WARMER than the long-term average. I track heating degree days because of the energy-related consulting work I do. Heating degree days are a rough measurement of how much heating energy is required to heat a building, and is based on the average temperature day by day. Heating degree days for this heating season are actually about 5% LESS than the 30-year average (1971-2000) currently used as the base, indicating that it’s been WARMER than average to date this winter. The totals for this winter from this morning’s Strib: 4947 heating degree days. Average to this point in the heating season: 5223. (These numbers are always listed just below Paul Douglas’ weather spot on the back page of the Metro section.) This winter just SEEMS cold because recent winters have been so freakishly warm.
It is also worth noting that the Twin Cities 1971-2000 30-year average itself is about 1.5% lower than the 1951-1980 30-year average that was previously used as the base period measurement. Can anyone say “global warming”?