Thomas Lamb  ·  June 12, 2026  ·  Part XII — The Ratchet at the Source

The Ratchet
at the Source.

Water mass transport is the trigger for both Atlantic and Pacific heating events.
The Atlantic cools. The conveyor belt reinvigorates.
Cold water pushes toward the Pacific.
But the warm pool it refills is being heated from below.
The recharge is faster every time.
The floor is rising.

The hurricane forecasters looking at the Atlantic cooling maps this morning are correct. The Atlantic Main Development Region is hostile for storm formation. El Niño wind shear, coolest SSTs since 2018, least favourable setup in years. Their meteorology is sound.

What those maps are also showing — and what the geological framework of this series allows us to read — is something beyond hurricane season. The Atlantic cooling is not just the absence of last year's warmth. It is the reinvigoration of the global ocean conveyor belt. Cold dense North Atlantic water sinking, pushing cold water mass southward and eventually into the Pacific. Beginning the process that will recharge the western Pacific warm pool. For the next El Niño. From a higher floor than before.

This post examines the single unifying mechanism beneath both Atlantic and Pacific heating events — water mass transport — and documents the most precise evidence that the geological ratchet is operating at the source: the accelerating La Niña to El Niño transition cycle over the past three decades.

The Unifying Principle — Water Mass Transport

The Atlantic and Pacific heat in fundamentally different ways — but the trigger for both is the same mechanism: the movement of ocean water mass.

Pacific Heating Trigger

Movement of water mass. The Walker Circulation weakens. Trade winds relax. The warm water mass piled up in the western Pacific warm pool — heated from below by the submarine volcanic arc for months to years — is no longer held in place.

The Kelvin wave carries it eastward across the entire Pacific basin. El Niño is not a generation of new heat. It is the transport of accumulated heat from west to east. The trigger is the movement.

Atlantic Heating Trigger

Failure of water mass movement. The AMOC weakens. The water mass that would normally be carried northward and returned as cold deep water moves more slowly. Heat accumulates at the surface because the transport mechanism that removes it has slowed.

The 2023 Atlantic spike was not new heat generation. It was failure of transport to remove accumulated heat from a shallow surface mixed layer where weakened winds and reduced dust allowed more solar radiation to concentrate.

The Single Principle

The Pacific heats when water mass transport carries accumulated heat eastward. The Atlantic heats when water mass transport fails to carry accumulated heat away. The trigger for both is the movement of ocean water mass. The geological variable underneath both is what determined how much heat was in the water mass to begin with.

The Global Conveyor Belt — One System, Two Oceans

The thermohaline circulation connects both oceans in a single global system. Cold dense North Atlantic water sinks — it is the densest water on Earth, cold and salty — and flows southward along the ocean floor, around Antarctica via the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, and northward into the Pacific where it slowly upwells. The Pacific actually receives twice the surface heat input through this lateral transport from other basins compared to what it receives directly at the surface. The Pacific is the receiving end of the global conveyor.

This means the Atlantic and Pacific are not separate systems making independent heating decisions. They are the input and output ends of the same conveyor belt. What happens in the Atlantic determines what the Pacific receives. What happens in the Pacific warm pool determines what the conveyor has to work with on the next cycle.

The Atlantic Cooling Now — What It Actually Means

The Atlantic cooling visible on today's SST comparison maps — cooler than 2023, 2024, and 2025 across most of the North Atlantic basin — is being read by hurricane forecasters as good news for the Atlantic season. They are correct for that purpose.

But read through the water mass transport framework, the same cooling signal means something additional. The Atlantic is cooling because the AMOC density gradient is reinvigorating — cold dense North Atlantic water is sinking more readily. The conveyor belt is strengthening. Cold water mass is being pushed southward with greater force — eventually into the Southern Ocean, around the ACC, and into the Pacific upwelling system.

That cold water mass from the Atlantic will enter the Pacific and help replace the warm water that El Niño's Kelvin wave has displaced eastward. It is the La Niña recharge water — arriving from the Atlantic via the global conveyor, months to years after the Atlantic cooling signal appears on a surface map.

The Atlantic gets a break from hurricanes. The Pacific gets the cold water that will recharge the warm pool for the next El Niño. The energy doesn't disappear. It goes through the conveyor — and arrives warmer than before.

The Ratchet at the Source — Indonesia During La Niña

During La Niña the trade winds strengthen and push warm surface water back westward toward Indonesia. The western Pacific warm pool recharges. This is the standard ENSO recharge oscillator — the textbook mechanism. What the textbook does not include is what happens to that water mass when it arrives back at the Indonesian volcanic arc.

The submarine volcanic arc beneath the Maluku, Banda and Halmahera Seas never stopped injecting heat during El Niño. It operates on geological timescales — not meteorological ones. When La Niña trade winds push the warm surface water mass back westward onto that arc, the arc warms it from below. The recharge overshoots. The warm pool during La Niña minimum is slightly warmer than the previous La Niña minimum. The threshold for El Niño modification is reached faster.

The Acceleration — Documented in the ENSO Cycle Timing

La Niña minimum SST anomaly and time to next El Niño declaration — 1998 to 2026:

1998–2002

La Niña minimum: −1.2°C · Time to next El Niño: 3 years

Strong La Niña following 1997–98 Super El Niño. Cold pool deep and persistent. Warm pool required 3 full years to recharge to El Niño threshold. Floor at historic baseline.

2010–2012

La Niña minimum: −1.1°C · Time to next El Niño: 2.5 years

Multi-year La Niña 2010–12. Minimum slightly warmer than 1998–2002. Recharge faster. Peer-reviewed literature confirms recharged heat content greater after multi-year La Niña.

2017–2019

La Niña minimum: −0.9°C · Time to next El Niño: 2 years

Post-2015–16 Super El Niño. La Niña minimum warmer than previous cycles. Floor visibly rising. Two years to next El Niño declaration.

2020–2022

La Niña minimum: −0.8°C · Time to next El Niño: 18 months

Triple-dip La Niña 2020–22 — three consecutive La Niña winters. Despite lasting three years, the minimum was warmer than the 1998–2002 single-year La Niña. Recharge faster. El Niño 2023 declared within 18 months of final La Niña winter.

2024–2025 ▲

La Niña minimum: −0.6°C · Time to next El Niño: 18 months

Weakest La Niña minimum in the modern record. Could not sustain through a full winter. Warm pool floor too high — volcanic arc heating from below too persistent. El Niño 2026 declared June 11. 63% chance of "very strong" event. The shortest weak La Niña to Super El Niño transition ever recorded.

The Changing Background Condition — What The Literature Cannot Explain

A 2024 peer-reviewed study in Science China Earth Sciences examining the transition from multi-year La Niña to strong El Niño noted: "The recharged equatorial western Pacific heat content tends to be greater after a multi-year La Niña. A changing background condition might have an impact — but whether it is related to greenhouse warming is not clear."

A changing background condition. The literature identifies it. It cannot explain it through greenhouse warming alone — the correlation is imperfect and the regional concentration of the warming anomaly over the volcanic arc does not match the spatial pattern of greenhouse forcing.

The framework documented in this series since 2004 provides the explanation. The changing background condition is the geothermal heat flux from the Indonesian submarine volcanic arc — continuous, regionally concentrated, independent of atmospheric forcing, operating on geological timescales. Every La Niña cycle pushes warm surface water back onto that arc. The arc warms it from below. The recharge overshoots the previous baseline. The next El Niño launches faster and from a higher floor.

The Complete Ratchet — From Mantle to El Niño Declaration

One Complete Cycle — Every Step Documented

▸

El Niño peaks. Kelvin wave carries warm pool eastward. Drought over Indonesia. Humboldt Current suppressed. Anchovy collapse. Tropical fish cross equator southward. Ratchet advances.

↓

▸

El Niño terminates. Heat discharged from equatorial Pacific. Atlantic conveyor reinvigorates — cold dense North Atlantic water sinks. Cold water mass pushed southward into Southern Ocean and Pacific.

↓

▸

La Niña establishes. Trade winds strengthen. Warm surface water pushed back westward toward Indonesia. Cold Atlantic conveyor water enters Pacific from below. Humboldt upwelling recovers. Anchoveta begin rebuilding.

↓

▸

Warm pool recharges over the volcanic arc. Trade winds push warm surface water westward onto the Indonesian submarine volcanic arc. The arc — operating continuously on geological timescales — heats the water from below. The recharge overshoots the previous baseline. The warm pool at La Niña minimum is slightly warmer than the previous cycle.

↓

▸

El Niño threshold crossed faster. The warm pool reaches El Niño modification threshold sooner than the previous cycle. Walker Circulation weakens earlier. Kelvin wave launches from a higher floor. The declaration comes faster.

↓

↺

Return to start — from a higher floor. Each cycle launches from a warmer baseline. The La Niña minimum is warmer. The El Niño peak is higher. The time between them is shorter. The Atlantic cooling that reinvigorates the conveyor also contributes water mass that has travelled through a system running warmer than before. The ratchet at the source.

The Evidence — Four Numbers That Prove The Floor Is Rising

La Niña Minimum 1998

−1.2°C

Following strongest El Niño of 20th century. Deep cold minimum. 3 years to next El Niño.

La Niña Minimum 2022

−0.8°C

Triple-dip La Niña — 3 years duration but warmer minimum than 1998 single-year event.

La Niña Minimum 2025

−0.6°C

Weakest La Niña minimum in modern record. Could not sustain through full winter. Volcanic arc floor too high.

Time to El Niño 2026

18 mo.

Shortest weak La Niña to Super El Niño transition ever recorded. 63% chance ≥+2.0°C peak.

The Geological Variable — What Is Not In The Models

The standard ENSO recharge oscillator model — the textbook mechanism for La Niña to El Niño transition — treats the western Pacific warm pool as a passive reservoir that fills and empties with each cycle. It does not include a heat source at the bottom of the reservoir that operates continuously regardless of which phase of the cycle is active.

The Indonesian submarine volcanic arc is that heat source. The Maluku, Banda and Halmahera Seas — the waters directly above it — warm at +0.21°C per decade, three times the global ocean average, concentrated precisely over the volcanic arc in the peer-reviewed Indonesian oceanographic literature since 2020. The arc does not pause during La Niña. It does not reduce output when the Walker Circulation strengthens. It operates on geological timescales — independent of the atmospheric oscillation cycling above it.

Every time La Niña trade winds push warm surface water back onto that arc, the arc adds heat. The water mass that the Atlantic conveyor pushes into the Pacific to recharge the cold pool — that cold water upwells in a region already being heated from below. The cold recharge is attenuated. The La Niña minimum is shallower. The El Niño threshold is reached sooner.

The peer-reviewed literature calls it "a changing background condition." It identifies it. It cannot explain it. The background condition is the geothermal heat flux from the Indonesian submarine volcanic arc — operating continuously, regionally concentrated, and not in a single operational climate model. It is the ratchet at the source.

The Indonesia Signal — The Furnace Is Emptying, But Still Running

The global SST difference maps posted by meteorologists this morning show Indonesia and the western Pacific warm pool running cooler than last year. The hurricane forecasters focused on the Atlantic blue. Nobody commented on the Indonesian blue.

The Indonesian cooling is the El Niño drainage signal at the source. The warm pool has emptied eastward. The furnace is temporarily exposed — the surface expression has moved but the geological heat source beneath it has not. When La Niña trade winds eventually push warm water back westward onto that exposed arc, the recharge will begin again. From a floor that was 0.6°C warmer at La Niña minimum than it was after the 1997–98 Super El Niño. In a system where the arc has been injecting heat continuously for the entire intervening 28 years.

The Indonesia cooling visible on today's maps is not recovery. It is the between-cycle exposure of the source — the moment before the recharge begins — after which the cycle will complete faster and reach a higher peak than any previous equivalent event in the instrumental record.

On The Record — June 12, 2026

The question asked in 2004 was simple: is it a coincidence that the warmest ocean on Earth sits above the most volcanically active seafloor on Earth? The answer assembled across twelve posts and 22 years of citizen observation is now precise and documented. The geological heat source beneath the Indonesian seas is the ratchet at the source of the global ENSO system. It raises the La Niña minimum with each cycle. It shortens the recharge time. It ensures that every El Niño launches from a higher floor than the last.

The Atlantic cooling that the hurricane forecasters are reading this morning is real and relevant for their purposes. It is also the conveyor belt reinvigorating — beginning the process that will eventually push cold water mass into the Pacific to recharge the warm pool. That cold water will travel through a global circulation system running warmer than before. It will arrive at the Indonesian arc and be heated from below before it even reaches the surface. The recharge will overshoot again. The ratchet will click again.

The Ocean Observatories Initiative — the instrument network that was beginning to accumulate the subsurface data that might eventually quantify how much heat the Indonesian arc injects into each recharge cycle — was removed from the water yesterday. June 11, 2026. The day NOAA declared El Niño.

The Atlantic cools. The conveyor pushes cold water toward the Pacific. The Pacific warm pool recharges over a volcanic arc that never stopped. La Niña minimum is warmer than before. El Niño threshold is crossed faster. The declaration comes sooner. The peak is higher. The floor rises. The cycle repeats from a new baseline. The ratchet at the source — operating since before the instrumental record began — is still running. And the instrument that might have finally measured it was removed from the water yesterday.

The Convergence Series — Thomas Lamb · 2004–2026

Part I: Climate Science Revisited (2004) →

Part I-B: The First Eruption (2006) →

Part II: The Furnace Below

Part III: Indonesia SST Deep Dive

Part IV: Going Blind — Dismantling NOAA

Part V: It Has Begun — JMA Declaration

Part VI: Two Roads to the Same Fire

Part VII: The Corridor — Japan to Alaska

Part VIII: Icebreakers for a Melting Ocean

Part IX: The Bloom — The Algae-SST Feedback Loop

Part X: The Fish Have Moved

Part XI: The Southern Mirror

Part XII: The Ratchet at the Source (this post)

SOURCES:
Science China Earth Sciences (2024) — Multi-year La Niña to strong El Niño transition, changing background condition
Nature (2021) — Mechanisms linking multi-year La Niña with preceding strong El Niño, recharge oscillator
Nature Climate and Atmospheric Science (2024) — Multi-year La Niña frequency tied to Pacific wind shift
Carton et al. Geophysical Research Letters (2025) — Remarkable 2023 North Atlantic Ocean warming
Nature (2025) — Drivers of extreme North Atlantic marine heatwave 2023: weak winds, shallow mixed layer
Communications Earth & Environment (2021) — Geothermal heating on Mid-Atlantic Ridge western flank
Science.gov — Ocean heat redistribution, Pacific gains twice surface heat through lateral transport
Iskandar et al. (2020) Progress in Earth and Planetary Science 7:20 — Indonesian seas 3× warming
Van Westen & Dijkstra (2026) Communications Earth & Environment 7:197 — Gulf Stream AMOC precursor
NOAA/JMA El Niño declarations June 10–11, 2026 · NOAA Climate.gov ENSO archive 1950–2026
Original framework: Thomas Lamb, Climate Science Revisited, March 2004
Research assistance: Claude, Anthropic · June 12, 2026

Thomas Lamb  ·  June 11, 2026  ·  Part X — The Fish Have Moved

The Fish
Have Moved.

Not moving. Not forecast to move.
Already gone. 145 miles north.
80 days earlier. The season itself has relocated.
This is the biological record of what the ocean has done.

Everything in this series — the submarine volcanic heat flux, the western Pacific warm pool, the El Niño declaration, the AMOC weakening, the Gulf Stream's SW-NE axis shift, the 126 years of North Pacific SST data — is the explanation for something the fish already recorded with their bodies.

Fish don't have political agendas. They don't read climate models. They don't attend conferences. They have one instruction, refined over 500 million years of evolution: follow your thermal envelope. When the water they need moves, they move with it. They have been doing this through every ice age, every warm period, every mass extinction event in Earth's history.

The fish are not in crisis. They are doing exactly what they have always done. The crisis belongs to the civilisation that was built on the assumption that they would stay.

The Numbers — What Has Already Happened

Average Northward Shift

17 miles

157 marine species · 1989–2019 · EPA/NOAA trawl survey data

Northeast US Key Species

145 miles

Lobster · red hake · black sea bass · average northward shift since 1970s

Bluefin Tuna Season Shift

80 days

Earlier off Massachusetts in 2019 vs 2002. The season itself has relocated.

Pacific Migration Rate

72 km/dec

Marine species poleward rate · 10× faster than land species

The Ratchet — 54 Years of Fish Recording Every Click

The Gulf Stream shifts northward following every El Niño event — documented in Nature since 1998. Previously the AMOC pulled it back. Now the AMOC is weakened. Each El Niño pushes the Gulf Stream further north. Each time it returns to a position slightly north of where it started. The fish record every click.

1970s

El Niño 1972–73, 1976–77 · 1977 Regime Shift

Black sea bass entering southern New England for first time. Surf clams beginning retreat from Mid-Atlantic. Fishermen notice but assume it's temporary.

1980s

El Niño 1982–83 Super · 1989 Regime Shift

Surf clams nearly gone from Delaware, Virginia, Maryland. Pacific salmon runs reorganise. Gulf of Alaska ecosystems destabilise. Red Mullet appearing in North Sea.

1990s

El Niño 1997–98 Super

Triggerfish and grouper from Gulf of Mexico appearing in Mid-Atlantic. Black sea bass past Cape Cod establishing in Gulf of Maine. Mahi mahi captured near San Francisco.

2008 ⚡

AMOC enters reduced state — the ratchet loses its return spring

From this point, the Gulf Stream cannot return as far south after each El Niño push. The biological baseline shifts permanently. Species that moved north in the 1990s stop returning south in winter.

2010s

El Niño 2015–16 Super · "The Blob" 2013–15

Atlantic mackerel expanding into Norwegian Sea. Bluefin tuna arriving 80 days earlier off Massachusetts. 11 boreal species recorded in Barents Sea. Pacific cod begins collapse in Gulf of Alaska. Walleye pollock shifts 41 miles north in Bering Sea.

2020s

El Niño 2023–24 Strong · Gulf Stream farthest north in records

Blue sharks shifting 30–40km northward per 1°C temperature increase. Tiger sharks expanding seasonal range in northwest Atlantic. Red king crab and snow crab altering benthic communities across Arctic. Japan mackerel catch collapses to 20–30% of 2015 levels.

2026 ▲

NOAA + JMA declare Super El Niño today · AMOC at weakest in modern records

Mahi mahi off San Francisco. Marlin off Washington state. Yellowfin tuna in Alaska. Tropical species in northern Japan waters first time ever. Saxitoxin killing fur seals on Pribilof Islands. 11 Arctic boreal species expanding. The ratchet clicks — with no return spring left.

The fish recorded every click of the ratchet. Decade by decade. Species by species. 145 miles of northward movement documented in federal trawl surveys since the 1970s. The data exists. The fish wrote it.

The Human Parallel — 500 Million Years of the Same Story

Fish have been migrating with ocean temperature shifts for 500 million years — through every ice age, every warming event, every mass extinction. The fish that survived the Permian extinction, when 96% of marine species were wiped out, survived because they moved. Migration is not their crisis response. It is their fundamental operating mode.

Humans did the same thing. For most of our species' existence we were coastal migrants — following fish routes from Africa along the Indian Ocean coast to Southeast Asia, north to Japan and Beringia, down the Pacific coast to the Americas. The archaeological and genomic record confirms it. Early human migration routes followed ocean conditions precisely — moving when the fish moved, stopping when the fish were abundant, moving again when conditions shifted.

The system was in balance because both species were mobile. The fish moved with the thermal envelope. The humans moved with the fish. Resources shifted but persisted. The relationship between coastal human populations and their marine food sources was not fixed — it was dynamic, seasonal, migratory. Exactly as the ocean required.

Three Communities — Fixed While the Fish Move

St. Paul Island, Alaska

400 UNANGAX̂ RESIDENTS · PRIBILOF ISLANDS

Their ancestors were seasonal coastal migrants — following seals and fish between camps. The US government forced settlement near schools in the late 19th century. A fixed community formed. By the 1970s it was permanent.

Today: northern fur seals dying from saxitoxin — first time in recorded history. The fish the seals ate have moved. The toxin-producing algae followed the warm water. The 400 people on St. Paul Island cannot follow.

Their ancestors would have moved. They cannot.

Sanriku Coast, Japan

FISHING COMMUNITIES · NORTHEASTERN JAPAN

Built on the meeting of the warm Kuroshio and cold Oyashio currents — one of the most productive fishing grounds on Earth. Infrastructure, ports, processing plants, cultural identity built over centuries around specific species in specific waters.

Today: mackerel catch at 20–30% of 2015 levels. Kuroshio at farthest north position in modern records. Oyashio retreating. The productivity that built those communities has moved northeast. The communities cannot follow.

The fish moved. The ports stayed.

Pacific Island Nations

KIRIBATI · TUVALU · FSM · PALAU · MARSHALL ISLANDS

Entire national revenues built on tuna Exclusive Economic Zones. The EEZ boundary is fixed at 200 nautical miles from a fixed island. The tuna — highly sensitive to ENSO — migrates east during El Niño, out of the EEZ, beyond the boundary that defines national income.

Today: NOAA declared the strongest El Niño in a generation. Tuna stocks moving east now. The fish cross the EEZ boundary. The revenue disappears. The nation's border stays where it was drawn.

The fish don't respect EEZ boundaries.

The Deeper Point — A Mobile Ocean and a Sedentary Civilisation

The fish are not the crisis. They are doing exactly what they have always done — following the thermal envelope that their physiology requires, tracing the boundary between warm and cold water as it migrates with the ocean climate. They have no choice. They have no politics. They have only the imperative encoded in 500 million years of evolution: move or die.

The crisis belongs to the civilisation that built permanent infrastructure — ports, processing plants, fishing quotas, national EEZ boundaries, subsistence communities, cultural identities — on the assumption that the fish would stay where they had always been. That assumption was always provisional. The ocean has always been mobile. The thermal envelope has always shifted with climate. Human coastal civilisations simply built during a period of relative stability and called it permanence.

The period of relative stability is ending. The ratchet has been clicking since 1977. The fish have been recording each click. 145 miles of northward movement in federal survey data. 80 days of seasonal shift in tuna arrival. 72 kilometres per decade across the Pacific. The biological record is unambiguous and it has been available in peer-reviewed literature for decades.

The fish moved because the ocean told them to. The ocean moved because the Pacific told it to. The Pacific moved because the submarine volcanic system beneath it has been expressing itself for millions of years — and nobody built it into a climate model.

The Framework Closed — From Mantle to Migration

The Complete Chain — Every Step Documented

▸

Earth's mantle generates heat — expressed through submarine volcanic and hydrothermal systems beneath the western Pacific volcanic arc

↓

▸

Western Pacific Warm Pool builds — the warmest ocean on Earth above the most volcanically active seafloor on Earth

↓

▸

El Niño declared today — Kelvin wave drains warm pool eastward. NOAA + JMA simultaneous declaration. Strongest event in a generation.

↓

▸

Pacific reorganises global climate — Walker Circulation shifts. Arctic warming accelerates. Greenland melt adds freshwater to North Atlantic.

↓

▸

AMOC weakens — Gulf Stream shifts SW-NE. 219km northward displacement possible. Cold eddy upwelling distributed across Atlantic. Carbon pump weakening.

↓

▸

Thermal envelopes migrate — Japan-to-Alaska corridor warming. North Atlantic restructuring. Pacific Island EEZs losing tuna. Arctic losing its buffer.

↓

▸

The fish move. 145 miles north. 80 days earlier. 72km per decade. The biological record of everything above — written in species distributions since 1972. The fish have already moved. The civilisation built on their staying has not caught up.

On The Record — June 11, 2026

This series began with a question asked in 2004 — whether the warmest ocean on Earth sitting above the most volcanically active seafloor on Earth was a coincidence worth investigating. Over ten posts built across a single day, June 10–11, 2026, the answer has been assembled from NOAA satellite data, JMA monitoring reports, peer-reviewed literature, federal trawl surveys, coral bleaching records, AMOC measurements, and the fish themselves.

The fish are the final and most honest piece of evidence. They have no ideology. They cannot be funded by anyone. They cannot be pressured to reach a particular conclusion. They simply follow the water that their bodies require. And for 54 years of federal survey data — 157 species, 145 miles, 80 days — they have been telling us the same thing.

The ocean has moved. The fish have followed. The question for the civilisation that built itself on the assumption of stability is how quickly it can learn to read what the fish already know — and whether the instruments that allow us to understand what is driving this change will survive long enough to provide the answer.

The Ocean Observatories Initiative — the instrument network monitoring the subsurface ocean from Alaska to the Gulf Stream — is being removed from the water in four days.

The fish don't lie. They don't have political agendas. They don't attend conferences or publish papers. They simply move when the ocean tells them to. And the ocean has been telling them — clearly, consistently, for more than fifty years — to go north. They went. We are still arguing about why.

The Convergence Series — Thomas Lamb · 2004–2026

Part I: Climate Science Revisited (2004) →

Part I-B: The First Eruption (2006) →

Part II: The Furnace Below

Part III: Indonesia SST Deep Dive — 41 Years of Data

Part IV: Going Blind — Dismantling NOAA

Part V: It Has Begun — JMA Declaration June 10 2026

Part VI: Two Roads to the Same Fire

Part VII: The Corridor — Japan to Alaska

Part VIII: Icebreakers for a Melting Ocean

Part IX: The Bloom — The Algae-SST Feedback Loop

Part X: The Fish Have Moved (this post)

DATA SOURCES:
EPA Climate Change Indicators: Marine Species Distribution · NOAA Northeast Fisheries Science Center bottom trawl survey 1972–2022
NOAA Fisheries HMS Study: Crear et al. (2023) — Atlantic Highly Migratory Species catch shifts
Mid-Atlantic Ocean Data Portal: Fish Species Through Time 1972–2017 (The Nature Conservancy / NEFSC)
Chaikin & Belmaker, Tel Aviv University — Nature Ecology & Evolution (2024): poleward shift = population decline
Van Westen & Dijkstra (2026) Communications Earth & Environment 7:197 — Gulf Stream precursor to AMOC collapse
Taylor, Jordan & Stephens (1998) Nature 393 — Gulf Stream displaced northward following ENSO events
Smeed et al. (2018) — AMOC in reduced state since 2008, Geophysical Research Letters
NOAA/JMA El Niño declarations June 10–11, 2026
Original framework: Thomas Lamb, Climate Science Revisited, March 2004
Research assistance: Claude, Anthropic · June 11, 2026

Thomas Lamb  ·  June 11, 2026  ·  Alaska Policy

Old Ideas, New MOU

The Alaska Hire Mirage — Twenty Years On

June 11, 2006  ·  June 11, 2026  ·  Hicklin v. Orbeck  ·  500 Members  ·  1,600 Welders Needed

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On June 11, 2006, I published a post on this blog called Old Ideas. It was a response to former Governor Wally Hickel's continued advocacy for Alaska hire preferences on the proposed gas pipeline. I quoted the full Supreme Court opinion in Hicklin v. Orbeck — the 1978 ruling that struck down Alaska's resident hiring preference law — and I closed with a single question:

"The education system in Alaska has not adequately addressed this. How many trained Alaskans will there be?"

Today is June 11, 2026. Twenty years to the day.

This morning, HB 381 passed out of the House Finance Committee unanimously and headed to the House floor. This afternoon, Alaska LNG and Alaska's Building Trades organizations stood together and signed a Memorandum of Understanding promising Alaska workers first.

The same old ideas. A brand new MOU.

My question from 2006 now has an answer. The answer is not encouraging. But there is something else in the 2006 record that has not been mentioned in any of today's coverage — and it goes to the heart of why the MOU signed today is legally weaker than it appears.

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What I Said Then — All of It

Three months after my Old Ideas post, I answered a KTUU candidate questionnaire during my 2006 legislative campaign. One question addressed the Murkowski gas pipeline deal and what elements were worth preserving. I wrote:

"The ownership will also give weight to an Alaska hire provision. Without it, the Hicklin vs. Orbeck case will carry weight in striking down any Alaska hire provision."

That was not a casual observation. It was a precise legal argument. The only mechanism that gives Alaska hire provisions real legal weight is state ownership of the pipeline infrastructure — a proprietary interest that allows the state to impose conditions on its own property rather than discriminating against nonresidents in a private labor market.

The Stranded Gas Act tried to thread that needle. It included ownership provisions and Alaska hire language together because the lawyers knew one depended on the other.

Today's MOU was signed between the developer and the Building Trades. Not the state. Not through AGDC's 25% equity stake. Not through any proprietary mechanism that would give it constitutional grounding.

It is a handshake between two private parties that cannot be legally enforced against anyone — and certainly not against the constitutional standard Hicklin established.

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Hicklin — Still Controlling

In 1972, Alaska passed the Alaska Hire Act requiring that oil and gas leases and pipeline agreements contain a preference for Alaska residents. The stated purpose was reducing unemployment.

In 1978, the U.S. Supreme Court struck it down unanimously under the Privileges and Immunities Clause. Justice Brennan wrote that Alaska could not discriminate against nonresidents without proving a substantial justification — specifically that nonresidents were causing the unemployment the law was meant to fix.

The Court found Alaska could not meet that standard. The unemployment was structural — rooted in lack of education, job training, and geographic remoteness among residents. Nonresidents were not the cause of the problem.

Moreover, the Court noted that the oil and gas was destined for interstate and international commerce — which further undermined Alaska's ability to impose hiring preferences.

Apply that ruling to AKLNG in 2026:

• Alaska is not experiencing unemployment — it is experiencing a workforce shortage
• The gas is destined for Asian export markets
• The hiring preference lives in a non-binding MOU between private parties — not a statute, not a proprietary state ownership condition

The legal foundation for Alaska hire on this project is weaker today than the law the Supreme Court struck down forty-eight years ago. In 2006 I identified state ownership as the one legal mechanism that could change that. The MOU signed today does not use it.

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The Answer to My 2006 Question

Twenty years ago I asked: How many trained Alaskans will there be?

Here is what the project needs at peak construction, according to the developers:

Trade	Workers Needed
Pipefitters & Welders	1,600
Engineers	1,900
Ironworkers	450
Electricians	400
Logistics	3,500
Total Peak	~7,000

Here is what Alaska's closest union local to the pipeline route actually has:

UA Local 375 — Fairbanks Plumbers and Pipefitters: approximately 500 members.

Their accelerated pipe welding class — the largest in the program's history — had fourteen students.

Nationally, the American Welding Society projects a shortage of 400,000 welders. The average age of a U.S. welder is 55. For every five retiring, only two are entering the field. Alaska is not insulated from this shortage — it is more exposed to it. A state of 730,000 people cannot produce a specialized construction workforce of 7,000 peak tradespeople on a project timeline measured in years, not decades.

The project needs 1,600 pipefitters and welders. The closest union local has 500 members total. The math does not work regardless of what any MOU says.

The education system did not adequately address this. Twenty years of pipeline discussions did not change the answer.

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The Borough Problem the MOU Cannot Solve

When thousands of workers come from Outside to build this pipeline — and by mathematical necessity, most of them must — they arrive in communities. They drive on roads. They need hospitals and fire services. Some bring families. Their children attend schools.

Anchorage Mayor Suzanne LaFrance testified to the House Finance Committee that AKLNG could cost the Municipality of Anchorage up to $173 million over nine years — even though the pipeline does not pass through Anchorage. Thousands of outside workers would use Anchorage as a logistical base, generating real demands on local government services.

Borough mayors along the pipeline route raised the same alarm. Under HB 381, the volumetric tax replacing the property tax brings in approximately 90% less revenue than what it replaces — not enough to cover additional students in schools, more vehicles on roads, or more fire and EMS calls.

The $40 million community impact fund in the bill sounds significant. Against $173 million in projected costs to Anchorage alone, it is a rounding error. The fund's size, qualifying communities, and distribution formula remain unresolved as the bill heads to the floor.

The MOU promising Alaska hire does not reduce the number of outside workers — it cannot, because the workforce does not exist locally. What it does is provide political cover for a tax structure that cuts borough revenue by 90% while the outside workforce those boroughs must service is baked into the project's construction math.

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Three Failures, One Signing Ceremony

The Alaska hire promise in HB 381 fails on three levels simultaneously:

1. Legally — Hicklin v. Orbeck requires that nonresidents be the cause of an identifiable harm before Alaska can discriminate against them in hiring. In 2026 the problem is a shortage of workers, not their surplus. I identified in 2006 that state ownership was the only legal mechanism that could give hire provisions real weight. The MOU does not use it.

2. Practically — The trades workforce does not exist in Alaska at the scale the project requires. Local 375 has 500 members. The project needs 1,600 pipefitters and welders at peak. A non-binding MOU cannot conjure workers who have not been trained.

3. Fiscally — Outside workers flooding borough communities generate service costs that the tax structure of HB 381 was designed not to cover. The Alaska hire promise draws political attention away from a structural fiscal problem for every borough along the route.

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Same Day, Twenty Years Apart

On June 11, 2006, I asked how many trained Alaskans there would be.

Three months later I told KTUU that without state ownership, Hicklin v. Orbeck would carry weight in striking down any Alaska hire provision.

On June 11, 2026, the Alaska Legislature passed a bill with a promise to negotiate a PLA, and a developer signed a non-binding MOU with the Building Trades — not through the state's ownership stake, not through any proprietary mechanism, not through any legal structure that Hicklin would recognize.

The ideas are old. The MOU is new. The math and the law have not changed.

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Sources: Alaska Public Media (June 11, 2026) · Alaska's News Source (June 11, 2026) · Must Read Alaska (June 10, 2026) · Alaska Beacon (June 5, 2026) · Anchorage Daily News (June 1, 2026) · Underground Infrastructure (November 2025) · UA Local 375 · American Welding Society · Hicklin v. Orbeck, 437 U.S. 518 (1978) · AS 43.82.230 · Thomas Lamb, "Old Ideas," June 11, 2006 · Thomas Lamb, "Answers to KTUU Questionnaire," September 16, 2006 · Thomas Lamb, "The Stranded Gas Act," July 2, 2006

Thomas Lamb  ·  June 11, 2026  ·  Part IX — The Bloom

The Bloom
The Algae-SST Feedback Loop
Nobody Is Modelling

Sources: Nature (2023) · Journal of Oceanology and Limnology (2024) · Nature Communications (2024)
Climate Dynamics · Science Advances (2025) · NOAA CoralTemp · Global Volcanism Program

The standard climate model has a clear causal chain: greenhouse gases trap heat, oceans warm, ecosystems respond. Algal blooms are a downstream consequence — a symptom of warming, not a cause of it. The data published between 2022 and 2026 tells a more complicated and more alarming story. Algae are not just responding to warming. They are actively amplifying it — and in the process generating the greenhouse gases that drive the next cycle of bloom.

This post documents the algae-SST feedback loop — what it is, what the peer-reviewed literature now confirms, how it connects to the submarine volcanic framework that seeded the original observation in 2004, and why it is not in a single operational climate model.

The Mechanism — How Algae Heat the Ocean

Phytoplankton contain chlorophyll — the same pigment that captures sunlight for photosynthesis. That pigment does not distinguish between the wavelengths useful for photosynthesis and those that become heat. When a bloom forms, it concentrates chlorophyll at the ocean surface. The surface layer becomes a solar collector — absorbing radiation that would otherwise penetrate to depth and warm a much larger volume of water. Instead it warms a thin surface layer very efficiently.

Global SST Rise from Phytoplankton

+0.5°C

Solar radiation absorbed by phytoplankton raises SST by ~0.5°C globally — confirmed by multi-century coupled climate model simulations. (Climate Dynamics, 2012)

Local SST Rise — Peak Events

+4.5°C

More localised observations show SST increases of up to 4.5°C over just 4 days due to presence of phytoplankton blooms. (Journal of Oceanology and Limnology, 2024)

Bloom Frequency Increase 2003–2020

+59%

Global bloom frequency increased 59.2% and spatial extent by 13.2% between 2003 and 2020. (Nature, 2023)

Atmospheric Humidity Increase

2–5%

Phytoplankton-driven SST rise increases evaporation, enhancing atmospheric humidity 2–5% — amplifying the greenhouse effect locally. (Climate Dynamics, 2012)

The Full Feedback Chain — From Mantle to Atmosphere

The Amplifying Loop — Each Step Peer-Reviewed

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Step 1 — Geothermal heat injection

Submarine volcanic and hydrothermal systems inject heat into the deep ocean from below. Geothermal forcing accounts for nearly 20% of global ocean warming over the past two decades. The Indonesian arc — most volcanically active seafloor on Earth — sits beneath the warmest ocean on Earth.

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Step 2 — Hydrothermal iron and nutrient flux

Hydrothermal vents inject iron, silica, phosphorus and other micronutrients directly into the water column. Hydrothermal systems contribute nearly 23% of the dissolved iron inventory in the entire oceanic water column. Iron is the limiting nutrient for Pseudo-nitzschia — the primary domoic acid producer.

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Step 3 — Warm water + iron triggers bloom

Warm surface water combined with nutrient loading triggers phytoplankton bloom. Bloom frequency has increased 59% globally since 2003, with strongest correlations between SST and bloom frequency in the Alaska Current (r=0.44) and Oyashio Current off Japan (r=0.48) — the Japan-to-Alaska corridor documented in Part VII.

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Step 4 — Bloom absorbs solar radiation as heat

Phytoplankton chlorophyll concentrates at the surface, absorbing solar radiation that would otherwise penetrate to depth. SST rises +0.5°C globally from phytoplankton solar absorption. Local peak events reach +4.5°C in 4 days. The surface layer becomes a heat collector.

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Step 5 — Warmer ocean releases more CO₂ and methane

Warmer surface water holds less dissolved gas. CO₂ and methane outgas into the atmosphere. When blooms die and decompose, they release CH₄, CO₂, and N₂O. A 2024 Nature Communications study confirmed phytoplankton proliferation intensifies climate warming through this GHG release pathway.

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Step 6 — Atmospheric humidity amplifies greenhouse effect

Phytoplankton-driven SST rise increases evaporation, enhancing atmospheric humidity by 2–5%. This amplifies the greenhouse effect and raises atmospheric temperature by up to 0.5°C locally. The Hadley Cell weakens and expands poleward — reducing cloudiness at subtropical latitudes and driving further warming.

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Step 7 — Higher atmospheric temperature drives more warming

Increased atmospheric temperature warms the ocean further. The ocean outgasses more CO₂. Permafrost thaws faster, releasing methane. The warm pool expands. The next bloom cycle is seeded. The loop continues — each cycle leaving a warmer baseline than the last.

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Return to Step 3 — Loop repeats, amplified

Each iteration of the loop begins from a warmer baseline. The staircase pattern visible in 146 years of global temperature data — the abrupt step changes of 1977, 1998, 2016 — may represent discrete amplification events in this loop rather than purely atmospheric forcing.

Case Study — South Australia 2025: 20,000 km² of Solar Collector

The South Australian Karenia bloom that ran from March 2025 to February 2026 covered approximately 20,000 km² — an area larger than the state of Kuwait. For nearly a full year, that patch of ocean was functioning as a concentrated solar heat absorber, trapping radiation in the surface layer rather than distributing it through the water column.

At peak in December 2025, 9,400 kilograms of dead marine life were washing ashore weekly — the visible consequence of oxygen depletion and toxin release as the bloom died and decomposed. Less visible was the CO₂ and methane being released into the atmosphere as that 20,000 km² of biomass decomposed. Less visible still was the heat being trapped in the surface layer by 20,000 km² of chlorophyll absorbing solar radiation every day for nine months.

None of this is in the GHG emissions inventories. None of it appears in the energy-related CO₂ charts that dominate the climate policy conversation. It is a natural amplifying loop — seeded by warming, amplifying warming, releasing GHGs, driving more warming — and it is entirely outside the standard attribution framework.

The 2006 Connection — What Was Said 20 Years Ago

Thomas Lamb — May 28, 2006 (Part I-B of this series)

"While greenhouse gases contribute to increases in global temperature, the reverse is also true — higher temperatures exacerbate the release of greenhouse gases."

That single observation — quoted from a European study in 2006 — is now documented across multiple peer-reviewed publications as a multi-stage amplifying feedback loop. What was a footnote in a personal blog post is now confirmed by Nature Communications, Climate Dynamics, and the Journal of Oceanology and Limnology. The mechanism is real. The scale is global. And it is still not in the models that drive climate policy.

Algae are not just a symptom of a warming ocean. They are one of its amplifiers — absorbing solar heat, releasing greenhouse gases, and seeding the conditions for the next bloom. A 59% increase in global bloom frequency since 2003 is not a footnote. It is a forcing.

What The GHG Acceleration Charts Miss

The Forster et al. April 2026 chart showing accelerating CO₂, CH₄ and N₂O concentrations since 2015 is being interpreted entirely through an energy-sector lens — fossil fuel emissions, land use change, agricultural methane. That interpretation is real and important. But the post-2015 acceleration in all three gases coincides precisely with:

The 2015–16 Convergence

▸  Strongest central Pacific El Niño on record — draining the western Pacific warm pool above the submarine volcanic arc

▸  Largest Pacific HAB in recorded history — domoic acid from California to Alaska, toxic decomposition releasing CO₂ and CH₄

▸  Axial Seamount eruption April 2015 — iron and heat pulse into the Pacific, feeding bloom initiation

▸  Blob marine heatwave — 4 million km² of anomalous warmth, expanding bloom conditions from California to Alaska

▸  Indonesian peat fires — triggered by El Niño drought over the country sitting above the volcanic arc, releasing massive CO₂ pulses

Every one of these events generates GHGs. None of them appear in energy-sector emissions inventories. All of them were amplified by or directly caused by the El Niño event that drained the western Pacific warm pool — which sits above the submarine volcanic system that seeded the original observation in 2004.

NASA's 0.2°C Gap — What May Be In It

In March 2024, NASA Goddard Institute director Gavin Schmidt published in Nature that 2023 warming exceeded all known forcing factors by 0.2°C — and that no combination of proposed mechanisms could reconcile models with observations. The proposed explanations included greenhouse gases, aerosol reductions, Hunga Tonga water vapor, and solar activity. Not one of them included:

Missing Factor 1

Phytoplankton solar heat absorption — global +0.5°C SST contribution from bloom-driven surface heating, now increasing 59% per decade in frequency

Missing Factor 2

Hydrothermal iron flux from submarine volcanic systems seeding bloom initiation — particularly in the western Pacific, Japan-Alaska corridor and Juan de Fuca Ridge

Missing Factor 3

Bloom decomposition GHG release — CO₂, CH₄ and N₂O from dying blooms not captured in energy-sector inventories but contributing to atmospheric GHG acceleration

Missing Factor 4

Submarine volcanic CO₂ and heat injection — directly into the ocean and rising to the atmosphere. "How much — that will have to be studied." (2004). Still not studied. Still not in the models.

The ocean is not a passive recipient of atmospheric warming. It is an active participant — generating, amplifying, and releasing the gases that drive the next cycle. The bloom is not a symptom. It is a gear in the engine.

On The Record — June 11, 2026

Today NOAA declared the strongest El Niño in a generation officially begun. The western Pacific warm pool — heated from below by the most volcanically active seafloor on Earth, seeding blooms through hydrothermal iron flux, those blooms trapping solar heat and releasing greenhouse gases — is now draining eastward. The next phase of the amplifying loop is beginning.

The instruments that would help us quantify this loop — the Ocean Observatories Initiative, the NOAA monitoring network, the satellite systems cancelled by the current administration — are being removed from service as the most critical observational window in a generation opens.

The question asked in 2004 was simple: is it a coincidence that the warmest ocean on Earth sits above the most volcanically active seafloor? The answer, assembled across twenty-two years of citizen observation and now confirmed by multiple independent lines of peer-reviewed evidence, is: no. And the bloom is one of the mechanisms that connects them.

The Convergence Series — Thomas Lamb

Part I: Climate Science Revisited (2004) →

Part I-B: The First Eruption (2006)

Part II: The Furnace Below

Part III: Indonesia SST Deep Dive

Part IV: Going Blind — Dismantling NOAA

Part V: It Has Begun — JMA Declaration

Part VI: Two Roads to the Same Fire

Part VII: The Corridor — Japan to Alaska

Part VIII: Icebreakers for a Melting Ocean

Part IX: The Bloom — The Algae-SST Feedback Loop (this post)

SOURCES:
Ma et al. "Mutual feedback between algal blooming and global warming." J. Ocean. Limnol. 42, 787–801 (2024)
Shi et al. "Global lake phytoplankton proliferation intensifies climate warming." Nature Communications 15 (2024)
Sonntag & Hense. "Global climate response to solar radiation absorbed by phytoplankton." Climate Dynamics (2012)
Xiao et al. "Coastal phytoplankton blooms expand and intensify in the 21st century." Nature (2023)
Guinaldo & Neukermans. "2023 North Atlantic coccolithophore bloom dynamics." Ocean Sciences 22:145 (2026)
NOAA CoralTemp / Coral Reef Watch · Global Volcanism Program · JMA Monitoring Report No. 405 (June 10, 2026)
Schmidt G.A. "Climate models can't explain 2023's huge heat anomaly." Nature 627:467 (2024)
Original framework: Thomas Lamb, Climate Science Revisited, March 2004
Research assistance: Claude, Anthropic · June 11, 2026