I did some digging around today and before you read this post entirely, let me explain a few things. First of all, you need to know what the word ACE means in meteorology. If you don't know then please read the definition below from Wikipedia:
Accumulated cyclone energy (ACE) is a metric used by various agencies to express the energy used by a tropical cyclone during its lifetime. The calculation takes a tropical cyclone's maximum sustained winds every six hours and multiplies it by itself to generate the values. These values are then added together which become a total for a storm and can either be divided by 10,000 to make them more manageable or added to other totals in order to work out a total for a particular group of storms. The calculation was originally created by William Gray and his associates at Colorado State University as the Hurricane Destruction Potential index, which took each hurricane's maximum sustained winds above 65 kn (120 km/h; 75 mph) and multiplied it by itself every six hours. This index was subsequently tweaked by the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in 2000 to include all tropical cyclones, with winds above 35 kn (65 km/h; 40 mph) and renamed accumulated cyclone energy. The index has since been used by various other agencies to calculate a storm's accumulated cyclone energy, including the Australian Bureau of Meteorology as well as the India Meteorological Department.
The highest ACE calculated for a single storm is 82, for Hurricane/Typhoon Loke in 2006.[1]
So since we have a La Nina coming again this winter, if you set the benchmark for ACE at 150 or higher (which means a very active season with lots of strong tropical systems and long duration, long tracked storms) in a La Nina season, since 1950, you get the following years, in order of highest ACE:
2005, 1995, 2017, 1950, 1998, 2020, 1999, 2010, 1955, 1964.
I then looked up how much snow we got the following winter. So the criteria here being used is ACE of 150 or higher and it has to be a La Nina. Again, these years are since 1950.
Cincinnati snowfall for those winters: (All numbers are for CVG)
2005-2006: 17.5"
1995-1996: 44.6"
2017-2018: 23.8"
1950-1951: 46.3"
1998-1999: 26.4"
2020-2021: 32.0"
1999-2000: 10.8"
2010-2011: 49.5"
1955-1956: 24.5"
1964-1965: 24.0"
AVG Snowfall using those years: 29.94" or approx 30"
As you can see, odds are we get an above normal snow season. 2 years are below avg, 4 years near to slightly above avg, and 4 years well above avg. 8 out of 10 years were near to above avg and only 2 were below. Out of the 2 below avg years only 1 was a clunker. I'd take those odds every time! Of course, much more goes into seasonal forecasting then what this post covers but thought that the numbers were very interesting anyway.
Finally, how is the ACE looking so far for 2021-2022 since this is another La Nina year? Below is a current table broken down by storm for 2021 as well as how much ACE each produced. NOTE: Larry is still going to add more then what is shown here obviously.
http://tropical.atmos.colostate.edu/Rea ... thatlantic
So, if you add that up, our current ACE index for 2021 is: 61.3 We have a ways to go but we're just getting to the peak of the hurricane season now and Larry will ultimately add quite a bit more to that number in the coming days since he is a long tracker and will have spent probably 5 or 6 days give or take, as a major hurricane. It'll be interesting to see how this season winds up and if we can make it to that 150 mark or not.