# "Climate Change" Was Supposed to Spawn Monster Storms-What Happened? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 10, 2013, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982 "2013-05-10T12:10:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Happy\_Fun\_Ball](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_fun_ball/32/17664_2.png) [@Happy\_Fun\_Ball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Fun_Ball)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/81 "2013-05-12T16:00:22Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > we need energy to survive economically. Trying to tax co2 out of existing is likely going to hurt the economy. If you hurt the economy you hurt the tax base. If you hurt the tax base then we have less money available to actually do something useful about GW I don’t want to hurt the economy, I want it to be strong. In a poor economy, people don’t care about the environment, they only care about themselves. That said, the invisible hand is a powerful tool and the easiest way to use it is with taxes. Subsidies can lead to all kinds of perverse incentives and corruption. A straight tax on carbon levied on each energy source will drive consumers to cheaper, and cleaner, sources. Companies, especially farmers and transportation companies who use the majority of energy in this country, will pass these costs straight on to their customers and all prices will rise. This is why corporate income taxes are stupid, all they do is increase the costs of products as the corporations strive to maintain their profit margins. To compensate for the rise in prices (which will be in effect a very regressive tax), we need to cut the income tax drastically especially on the low end. I am thinking of a negative income tax here to offset the price increase on food to to higher enrgy costs. Strive to make the system both revenue neutral and impact neutral. > [@Magiver](#): > > Natural gas is the obvious replacement for aging coal plants because of the reserves in North America. By default we will be reducing co2 as this occurs. There is growth potential for wind generation and we’re not too far off from seeing solar cells in some useful form. These are not idle thoughts, it’s happening right now in my state. We’ve shut down quite a few coal plants and we’ve been using natural gas for peak-use generators for many decades. We’ve also just built a solar-cell facility. we should also do what we can to increase nuclear power. Fukishima aside, there are ways to do this safely and the technology has moved on since those reactors were built. Also from a purely statistical perspective, it may be much safer. I.e., one level 7 disator every 20 years leads to 2000 more cancer cases compared to a coal plant releasing toxins (including radiation) leading to 10,000 more cancer cases in the same time period. These numbers are just made up, but surely we could do this calculation.when you add in the potential negative effects of climate change, the results may be irrefutable for all the horror associated with a level 7 accident. > [@Magiver](#): > > But back to the bio-fuels discussion. It’s just common sense to use the infrastructure we have now as an interim step to future developments. We already have a gas station on every corner. We already have diesel cars that outperform hybrids. I suspect the winner in the hybrid market is going to be an extended range vehicle using a micro-turbine as the ice engine. It’s a lighter/smaller footprint in the engine bay which allows for more batteries and can run at it’s optimum speed all the time. Micro-turbines would represent a considerable reduction in parts and complexity over the current atkinson cycle engines. I like biofuels because they also teach us an efficient way to remove carbon from the atmosphere. Changing technologies and increasing efficiency is a good thing, but it is only a marginal change; it will only give us a 2-3x reduction, at best. We need a paradigm shift to get the 10x reduction we need. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Fun\_Ball](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_fun_ball/32/17664_2.png) [@Happy\_Fun\_Ball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Fun_Ball)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/82 "2013-05-12T16:13:07Z")
One last reason we should move with alacrity with this issue and push for clean energy (and one reason I think conservatives are being stupid in letting their ideology rule in this issue), is hat for better or worse climate change is going to drive our economy for the next century. Clean energy is going to be as large a part of the world economy in the coming century as transportation was in the 20th century. This is regardless of what we do here in America. Simple population increases and the industralization of the world guarantee this. There is just no way that hydrocarbons are going to keep up with the energy needs of a hungry world. I would rather that the US developed and owned these technologies than China and Germany. By taking ideological steps in Congress to shut down renewable energy research, they are being awfully short sighted. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/83 "2013-05-12T16:15:38Z")
> [@yorick73](#): > > That’s _still_ not the quote I referenced. I have not attempted to discredit Prof. Jones. I was using a quote from his climate gate e-mails. If it is out of context please point it out. It is, because one of the properties of the ones pushing climate-gate (and the fact is several investigations showed that nothing contradicted the science and the scientists never did nothing more than trash talk that was supposed to be private) It is also important to realize that that boasting of Jones came from a personal e-mail, no one should consider that to be important for science unless it is published on a peer reviewed paper, the bottom line is that you are just pushing nothing. What is more important is the science that was made by Jones, and my experience has been that all the myths against him have been debunked, what you have to ask yourself is why do rags like the Daily mail still quote from already explained and investigated e-mails that are not reviewed and are not the published science? It goes again to the Personalization issue, the fallacy is to assume that there is value on discrediting the person and therefore all the science will be discredited, it does not work that way. > **[The Earth Is Warming Faster Now Than It Has in 11,000 Years](https://slate.com/technology/2013/03/global-warming-new-study-shows-warming-is-faster-than-it-has-been-in-11000-years.html)** > > Global warming is real. > [@](#): > > Global warming is real. > > Let’s get that out of the way right at the start. Climatologist Michael Mann’s bombshell study from years back created the “hockey stick” graph, showing that in the past century, the Earth’s overall temperature spiked, like a case of planetary flu. This study was immediately attacked by climate change deniers, who continue to flail away at it today. It has withstood these attacks, and is no longer seriously doubted by scientists who actually study the climate. > The reconstructed global temperature anomaly for the past 11,000 years. The Earth was warm (and warming) in the past, then started to cool…until the last century. > Image credit: Marcott et al. (via Climate Desk)\* > And now, a new study shows that this spike in temperatures is unprecedented going back over one hundred centuries. They looked at global temperature anomalies—deviations from an average or standard temperature—for 73 sites distributed across the planet, using fossils in sediments as a proxy for temperature. The chemical and isotopic composition of the fossils yields a fairly accurate measure of the environment temperature at the time the animal or plant making up the fossil lived. > > What they found is simply stunning: The rate at which the globe is warming right now is far, far faster than it ever has going back as far as they could measure, up to 11,300 years ago. In fact, over the past 5000 years, the Earth actually cooled by about 1.3°F…until the last 100 years, when our temperature spiked upwards by about the same amount. > > Mind you, this is the rate of warming, how quickly the global temperature is increasing. But they also showed the actual temperature of the planet is warmer now than it has been for 70-80 percent of the past over that time period. There have been times when the Earth was warmer, but the important point isn’t the actual temperature, but what it’s doing. > > And what it’s doing now is skyrocketing. > > Unfortunately, there’s worse news: Pretty much every prediction by climate scientists shows that this rate will not slow, and in fact may have been underestimated. Once again, when even Phil Jones himself and other scientists report that the trend is already significant and going up, it does take care of what he said in the e-mail. Denying that is really getting silly, and the context was offered, The Daily Mail in special should never be relied on for information. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/84 "2013-05-12T16:30:29Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > I’ve never read any objection to cost regarding clean water or sewage nor am I objecting toward spending money to alter the temperature. > > I’ve stated quite simply that spending money to reduce co2 is not based on any attempt at the best return for money spent . Regardless of co2 the planet is going to warm. At some point we risk releasing a great deal of methane and that’s going to be a huge problem. It may end up being much cheaper to simply block the sun with the release of reflective particles at high altitude. That would affect the temperature directly instead of trying to mitigate just one of the GH gases. > > What we should be doing is leveraging the assets we have and not trying to reinvent the wheel. There is no excuse for keeping 65 mpg diesels out of the US. It makes no sense. And I think we had this conversation before, Geo engeneering should be a last resort solution, and even when implemented it needs to be done while the emissions are also controlled. Otherwise you leave ocean acidification still going in and you are adding even more expense. As researchers have pointed out, the best way to look for better ways to geo engineer will also have to be investigated with computer simulations, but if the critics already do not trust simulations… > **[Index of /wp/archives/1333](https://www.realclimateeconomics.org/wp/archives/1333/)** > [@](#): > > How serious is global warming? Here’s one indication: the first rogue entrepreneurs have begun testing the waters on geoengineering, as Naomi Klein laments in her must-read New York Times op-ed. > > Sadly, Klein misses two important points. > > First, it’s not a question of if but when humanity will be compelled to use geoengineering, unless we change course on our climate policies (or lack thereof). Second, all of this calls for more research and a clear, comprehensive governance effort on the part of governments and serious scientists – not a ban of geoengineering that we cannot and will not adhere to. (See point number one.) > > Saying that we ought not to tinker with the planet on a grand scale – by attempting to create an artificial sun shield, for example – won’t make it so. Humanity got into this mess thanks to what economists call the “free rider” effect. All seven billion of us are free riders on the planet, contributing to global warming in various ways but paying nothing toward the damage it causes. No wonder it’s so hard to pass a sensible cap or tax on carbon pollution. Who wants to pay for something that they’re used to doing for free – never mind that it comes at great cost to those around them? > > It gets worse: Turns out the same economic forces pushing us to do too little on the pollution front are pushing us toward a quick, cheap fix – a plan B. > > Enter the Strangelovian world of geoengineering – tinkering with the whole planet. It comes in two distinct flavors: > > Sucking carbon out of the atmosphere; > > Creating an artificial sun shield for the planet. > > The first involves reversing some of the same processes that cause global warming in the first place. Instead of taking fossil fuels out of the ground and burning them, we would now take carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and bury it under ground. That sounds expensive, and it is. Estimates range from $40 to $200 and more per ton of carbon dioxide – trillions of dollars to solve the problem. > > That brings us to the second, scary flavor, which David Keith, a leading thinker on geoengineering, calls “chemotherapy” for the planet. The direct price tag to create an artificial sun shield: pennies per ton of carbon dioxide. It’s the kind of intervention an island nation, or a billionaire greenfinger, could pay for. > > You can see where economics enters the picture. The first form of geoengineering won’t happen unless we place a serious price on carbon pollution. The second may be too cheap to resist. > > … > > Once we reach that tipping point, there won’t be time to reverse warming by pursuing collective strategies to move the world onto a more sustainable growth path. Instead, speed will be of the essence, which will mean trying \*\*untested \*\*and largely hypothetical techniques like mimicking volcanoes and putting sulfur particles in the stratosphere to create an artificial shield from the sun. > > That artificial sunscreen may well cool the earth. But what else might it do? Floods somewhere, droughts in other places, and a host of unknown and largely unknowable effects in between. That’s the scary prospect. And we’d be experimenting on a planetary scale, in warp speed. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/85 "2013-05-12T17:42:05Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > That is nice, the climate scientists are not. Great. Then you and I are in agreement that the climate models are not able to predict the type of things the OP mentioned. > [@](#): > > Once again, that inaccuracy on specific years has been granted, what the attempt here is to minimize what they are doing well now, and that is to come very very close on matching the number of past extremes. And the reason is that while there uncertainty on some extreme events like hurricanes and tornadoes (this was already explained, why this is asked again leads others to wonder something else) there is more certainty that more GWG emitted will lead to more droughts, extreme flooding in some areas, more forest fires, ocean rise and acidification, the evidence for that is so clear that we have a lot to do to prepare. Your posts tends to respond in a different direction than the post you are responding to so I’m going to reinforce the context: My posts have nothing to do with whether we should or should not do anything. My posts are purely statements regarding the limits of our knowledge of the future due to limited understanding of what is being modeled and limited capabilities to model it. You stated that the models are able to accurately predict (based on matching historical data) number and intensity of storms, droughts, etc. Can you please point me to the results of some model over an extended period of time that match this? I haven’t seen any that mention storms, etc., but I’ve haven’t really looked at many of them either. > [@](#): > > Now as for the (already granted) uncertain numbers of hurricanes and tornadoes to come in a warming world, it remains a gamble that IMHO is not ok to also add to the most certain problems to come. So why do many continue to gamble that the sources they depend on are correct also regrading the the most certain ones to come? This has nothing to do with the topic I’m discussing, which is accuracy of climate models. > [@](#): > > As for the “unfortunate” skeptical science, you should be aware that conservative scientists do link to it as it is a resource, > > [http://earththeoperatorsmanual.com/about\_the\_program](http://earththeoperatorsmanual.com/about_the_program) > > [http://bbickmore.wordpress.com/](http://bbickmore.wordpress.com/) > > The blue links on the cited papers in Skeptical Science go to the published science. Great. Point me to the page or graph that shows results of climate models with respect to number and intensity of storms matching historical records as you claimed they do. Maybe I missed it, but I didn’t see anything like that. ---
**Author:** ![Docta\_G](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/2bfe46/32.png) [@Docta\_G](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Docta_G)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/86 "2013-05-12T17:50:46Z")
This isn’t fighting ignorance, but simply beating one’s head against a wall. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/87 "2013-05-12T18:00:24Z")
> [@L. G. Butts](#): > > we should also do what we can to increase nuclear power. Fukishima aside, there are ways to do this safely and the technology has moved on since those reactors were built. Also from a purely statistical perspective, it may be much safer. I.e., one level 7 disator every 20 years leads to 2000 more cancer cases compared to a coal plant releasing toxins (including radiation) leading to 10,000 more cancer cases in the same time period. These numbers are just made up, but surely we could do this calculation.when you add in the potential negative effects of climate change, the results may be irrefutable for all the horror associated with a level 7 accident. yes but the reality of it is a nuclear power plant is as popular as a Walmart in Yellow Stone National Park. We’ve made such a project out of them that we’ve lost the expertise to build one without turning it into a construction freak-show. The last one they built in my state was such a cost-overrun/structural fiasco they ended up turning it into a coal plant. It’s almost to the point we would have to pick a design in a national competition and give it some kind of political blessing. This is it, go forth and multiply. > [@L. G. Butts](#): > > I like biofuels because they also teach us an efficient way to remove carbon from the atmosphere. Changing technologies and increasing efficiency is a good thing, but it is only a marginal change; it will only give us a 2-3x reduction, at best. We need a paradigm shift to get the 10x reduction we need. I like it because it uses all of our existing technologies. We need something realistic NOW and diesels are it. I recently drove a “fuel guzzling” turbo diesel and damn it was fun to drive. It could easily knock out 45 mpg and could do everything I wanted it to do 100 percent of the time. It was a real trooper of a car. If I had the money it would be sitting in my garage right now along with a home built electric. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/88 "2013-05-12T18:00:53Z")
> [@Docta\_G](#): > > This isn’t fighting ignorance, but simply beating one’s head against a wall. Explain. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/89 "2013-05-12T18:11:07Z")
> [@RaftPeople](#): > > Great. Then you and I are in agreement that the climate models are not able to predict the type of things the OP mentioned. And already granted, and explained why, the take home point is that the OP was a \*\*\*staw man. \*\*\* > [@RaftPeople](#): > > This has nothing to do with the topic I’m discussing, which is accuracy of climate models. Actually it does, pressing on it only shows that the tactic is like the creationists, never mind that simulation can replicate past extremes, “because it can not predict exactly when (Or for the creationists, find yet another intermediate form) we should dismiss it”. It does not work that way, what you pointed out was a snapshot of what they are attempting to do next, it may take many years to do so, but once again, the fact that they can replicate roughly the timing of the extremes points to good progress, not a reason for dismissal. > [@RaftPeople](#): > > Great. > > Point me to the page or graph that shows results of climate models with respect to number and intensity of storms matching historical records as you claimed they do. > > Maybe I missed it, but I didn’t see anything like that. If I referred to storms, that was not my intention, the context should show that I already granted that the best papers out there have the experts reporting (and they are saying that for awhile already, once again the OP was a straw man) that regarding hurricanes and tornadoes it will be a gamble. Now, what about the past simulations roughly matching the past heat and cold levels? > [@](#): > > There are two major questions in climate modeling - can they accurately reproduce the past (hindcasting) and can they successfully predict the future? To answer the first question, here is a summary of the IPCC model results of surface temperature from the 1800’s - both with and without man-made forcings. All the models are unable to predict recent warming without taking rising CO2 levels into account. Noone has created a general circulation model that can explain climate’s behaviour over the past century without CO2 warming. The link BTW goes to the IPCC and it refers to this series of simulations and research work: [http://www.grida.no/publications/other/ipcc\_tar/?src=/climate/ipcc\_tar/wg1/figspm-4.htm](http://www.grida.no/publications/other/ipcc_tar/?src=/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/figspm-4.htm) > [@](#): > > Figure 12.7: Global mean surface temperature anomalies relative to the 1880 to 1920 mean from the instrumental record compared with ensembles of four simulations with a coupled ocean-atmosphere climate model (from Stott et al., 2000b; Tett et al., 2000) forced (a) with solar and volcanic forcing only, (b) with anthropogenic forcing including well mixed greenhouse gases, changes in stratospheric and tropospheric ozone and the direct and indirect effects of sulphate aerosols, and (c) with all forcings, both natural and anthropogenic. The thick line shows the instrumental data while the thin lines show the individual model simulations in the ensemble of four members.\*\* Note that the data are annual mean values. The model data are only sampled at the locations where there are observations.\*\* The changes in sulphate aerosol are calculated interactively, and changes in tropospheric ozone were calculated offline using a chemical transport model. Changes in cloud brightness (the first indirect effect of sulphate aerosols) were calculated by an offline simulation (Jones et al., 1999) and included in the model. The changes in stratospheric ozone were based on observations. The volcanic forcing was based on the data of Sato et al. (1993) and the solar forcing on Lean et al. (1995), updated to 1997. The net anthropogenic forcing at 1990 was 1.0 Wm-2 including a net cooling of 1.0 Wm-2 due to sulphate aerosols. The net natural forcing for 1990 relative to 1860 was 0.5 Wm-2 , and for 1992 was a net cooling of 2.0 Wm-2 due to Mt. Pinatubo. Other models forced with anthropogenic forcing give similar results to those shown in b (see Chapter 8, Section 8.6.1, Figure 8.15; Hasselmann et al., 1995; Mitchell et al., 1995b; Haywood et al., 1997; Boer et al., 2000a; Knutson et al., 2000). ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2013, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/90 "2013-05-14T11:54:28Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Actually it does, pressing on it only shows that the tactic is like the creationists, never mind that simulation can replicate past extremes, “because it can not predict exactly when (Or for the creationists, find yet another intermediate form) we should dismiss it”. > > It does not work that way Well, it does and it doesn’t. Take, say, a predicted increase in temperature: one can – quite easily – forecast _at least_ X amount of warming in Y years, even while going on to add that it’ll probably be some zany amount Z. If you can’t say it’ll _at a minimum_ be X, then, yes, the whole claim should of course be dismissed as hopelessly unscientific. Again, you’ve done it for temperature: boldly predicted at least a tenth-of-a-degree rise per decade. The same can and should be done here, with equal ease: if there’s a prediction to be made about hurricanes or tornadoes – or droughts, or named storms, or forest fires, or whatever – folks don’t need to make an exact Z claim so long as they can clear the oh-so-low bar of X. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2013, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/91 "2013-05-14T13:53:21Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > Well, it does and it doesn’t. > > Take, say, a predicted increase in temperature: one can – quite easily – forecast _at least_ X amount of warming in Y years, even while going on to add that it’ll probably be some zany amount Z. If you can’t say it’ll _at a minimum_ be X, then, yes, the whole claim should of course be dismissed as hopelessly unscientific. > > Again, you’ve done it for temperature: boldly predicted at least a tenth-of-a-degree rise per decade. The same can and should be done here, with equal ease: if there’s a prediction to be made about hurricanes or tornadoes – or droughts, or named storms, or forest fires, or whatever – folks don’t need to make an exact Z claim so long as they can clear the oh-so-low bar of X. Only that once again, you are depending on a hypothetical straw man from the climate scientists, as Richard Alley reported, they are not saying that, the current consensus is that the future number of extreme weather events like hurricanes can not be predicted with a lot of confidence, in essence, it remains a gamble that many deniers in power want to convince others to take. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2013, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/92 "2013-05-14T17:22:26Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Only that once again, you are depending on a hypothetical straw man from the climate scientists, as Richard Alley reported, they are not saying that, the current consensus is that the future number of extreme weather events like hurricanes can not be predicted with a lot of confidence, in essence, it remains a gamble that many deniers in power want to convince others to take. That’s magnificent; the latter part would’ve been a concise and accurate reply to the OP; it should’ve been this thread’s second post: _“the current consensus is that the future number of extreme weather events like hurricanes can not be predicted with a lot of confidence”_. I truly couldn’t agree more with that summary. ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2013, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/93 "2013-05-14T17:31:45Z")
> [@Prof.Pepperwinkle](#): > > Take a look at this: > [TCFAQ E11) How many tropical cyclones have there been each year in the](http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/tcfaq/E11.html) > > Granted, this is just one facet of a much larger situation, but for the record: > Since 1851 most years have had 12 or fewer named storms. > In 1887 there were 19 named storms, 15 in 1916, 21 in 1933, 16 in 1936, 13 each in 1949 and 1950, 14 in 1953, 18 in 1969, 13 in 1971, 13 in 1984 and 14 in 1990. All pretty spread out, right? Just usual variations in weather. > > Since 1990: > 19 in 1995, 13 in 1996, 14 in 1998, 15 in 2000, 15 in 2001, 16 in 2003, 15 in 2004, **28** in 2005, 15 in 2007, 16 in 2008, 19 in 2010 and 19 in 2011. The stats for 2012 aren’t in yet, but we did have Sandy. > Now having fewer than 15 major storms a year is the aberration. I am in no way shape or form a global warming denier, but this is a faulty conclusion. Before we had the kind of weather imaging we have now, there would be large storms that hung out in the ocean and never did anything and so never got named. Now days any large storm anywhere in the world will be detected and named. To claim this indicated an increase is storm activity would be similar to saying that there was a sudden increase in breast cancer with the invention of the mammogram. There is plenty of good evidence of climate change but this isn’t one of them. ---
**Author:** ![Fubaya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c2a13f/32.png) [@Fubaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fubaya)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2013, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/94 "2013-05-14T20:38:31Z")
> [@Buck\_Godot](#): > > I am in no way shape or form a global warming denier, but this is a faulty conclusion. Before we had the kind of weather imaging we have now, there would be large storms that hung out in the ocean and never did anything and so never got named. Now days any large storm anywhere in the world will be detected and named. > > To claim this indicated an increase is storm activity would be similar to saying that there was a sudden increase in breast cancer with the invention of the mammogram. > > There is plenty of good evidence of climate change but this isn’t one of them. The link actually addresses that ---
**Author:** ![Living\_Well\_Is\_Best\_Revenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/6bbea6/32.png) [@Living\_Well\_Is\_Best\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Living_Well_Is_Best_Revenge)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2013, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/95 "2013-05-14T20:57:52Z")
> [@Ken001](#): > > You need to be open minded about this stuff. The Earth’s climate is a very complex system. Humans have only invented the technology to observe and record climate over the past 300 years - on a planet 4.5 billion years old. Furthermore the really intense information gathering has only been possible for 30 years and computing power just about copes with the data. You are going to lose people right here. Many of the ones who deny climate change believe the earth is 6,000 years old. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2013, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/96 "2013-05-14T23:50:01Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > That’s magnificent; the latter part would’ve been a concise and accurate reply to the OP; it should’ve been this thread’s second post: _“the current consensus is that the future number of extreme weather events like hurricanes can not be predicted with a lot of confidence”_. I truly couldn’t agree more with that summary. If you had looked at the thread you would had noticed that I was not posting here early. And the video from Richard Alley and the opinion of climate scientists on the issue has been posted before, the OP should had know better already. The take home lesson is that what Richard Alley and others reported has been posted by me and others in other threads, the problem with posters like the OP is that they never learn, or the objective is to discredit climate scientists with a straw man. What scientists actually say is that the number of hurricanes is so far unpredictable, but as Richard Alley also points out, that is not a reason to be complacent, there are other much more likely things that will happen in a warmer world if we do not make a concerted effort to limit emissions, and even if hurricanes turn to be few in a warming world, the problem is that all that increase in water vapor and energy will be part of the few hurricanes that are coming and there are reports that this took place with Sandy. > **[How Global Warming Made Hurricane Sandy Worse | Climate Central](https://www.climatecentral.org/news/how-global-warming-made-hurricane-sandy-worse-15190)** > > Global warming made Hurricane Sandy more destructive through sea level rise, warmer ocean temps, and other influences. > [@](#): > > Scientists cannot yet answer the specific question of whether climate change made Hurricane Sandy more likely to occur, since such studies, known as detection and attribution research, take many months to complete. What is already clear, however, is that climate change very likely made Sandy’s impacts worse than they otherwise would have been. > > There are three different ways climate change might have influenced Sandy: through the effects of sea level rise; through abnormally warm sea surface temperatures; and possibly through an unusual weather pattern that some scientists think bore the fingerprint of rapidly disappearing Arctic sea ice. Of course the gamble here is the number of hurricanes, if global warming give us less hurricanes we still will have to worry about them being stronger than before, on the other hand they could also increase in number… with the same [del]steroids[/del] global warming gases added to the background. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2013, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/97 "2013-05-15T00:14:16Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > If you had looked at the thread you would had noticed that I was not posting here early. > > And the video from Richard Alley and the opinion of climate scientists on the issue has been posted before, the OP should had know better already. > > The take home lesson is that what Richard Alley and others reported has been posted by me and others in other threads, the problem with posters like the OP is that they never learn, or the objective is to discredit climate scientists with a straw man. > > What scientists actually say is that the number of hurricanes is so far unpredictable, but as Richard Alley also points out, that is not a reason to be complacent, there are other much more likely things that will happen in a warmer world if we do not make a concerted effort to limit emissions, and even if hurricanes turn to be few in a warming world, the problem is that all that increase in water vapor and energy will be part of the few hurricanes that are coming and there are reports that this took place with Sandy. > > [How Global Warming Made Hurricane Sandy Worse | Climate Central](http://www.climatecentral.org/news/how-global-warming-made-hurricane-sandy-worse-15190) > Of course the gamble here is the number of hurricanes, if global warming give us less hurricanes we still will have to worry about them being stronger than before, on the other hand they could also increase in number… with the same [del]steroids[/del] global warming gases added to the background. Stop while you’re ahead. This is valid: “the current consensus is that the future number of extreme weather events like hurricanes can not be predicted with a lot of confidence” This is speculation: "and energy will be part of the few hurricanes that are coming and there are reports that this took place with Sandy. " This is speculation: “if global warming give us less hurricanes we still will have to worry about them being stronger than before,” ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2013, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/98 "2013-05-15T00:35:57Z")
> [@RaftPeople](#): > > Stop while you’re ahead. > > This is valid: > “the current consensus is that the future number of extreme weather events like hurricanes can not be predicted with a lot of confidence” > > This is speculation: > "and energy will be part of the few hurricanes that are coming and there are reports that this took place with Sandy. " Nope. This is based on already measured increases on water vapor, ocean rise, and increase in temperature of the oceans. > [@RaftPeople](#): > > This is speculation: > “if global warming give us less hurricanes we still will have to worry about them being stronger than before,” Again, the simple logic is on the increase on matter (water vapor), ocean rise and energy in the atmosphere thanks to the increase in GWG. The problem here is assuming that all that is not or will not affect the strength of the hurricanes that come, and this is not even taking into account the number of hurricanes that a warming world will bring. > **[What is the link between hurricanes and global warming?](https://skepticalscience.com/hurricanes-global-warming-intermediate.htm)** > > \It is unclear whether global warming is increasing hurricane frequency but there is increasing evidence that warming increases hurricane intensity.\ > [@](#): > > What the science says… > > It is unclear whether global warming is increasing hurricane frequency but there is increasing evidence that warming increases hurricane intensity. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2013, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/99 "2013-05-15T00:46:49Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Nope. > > This is based on already measured increases on water vapor, ocean rise, and increase in temperature of the oceans. > Again, the simple logic is on the increase on matter (water vapor), ocean rise and energy in the atmosphere thanks to the increase in GWG. > > The problem here is assuming that all that is not or will not affect the strength of the hurricanes that come, and this is not even taking into account the number of hurricanes that a warming world will bring. > > [What is the link between hurricanes and global warming?](http://www.skepticalscience.com/hurricanes-global-warming-intermediate.htm) From the NOAA: “We find that, after adjusting for such an estimated number of missing storms, there is a small nominally positive upward trend in tropical storm occurrence from 1878-2006. But statistical tests reveal that this trend is so small, relative to the variability in the series, that it is **not significantly distinguishable from zero** (Figure 3).” and “The evidence for an upward trend is even weaker if we look at U.S. landfalling hurricanes, which even show a **slight negative trend** beginning from 1900 or from the late 1800s (Figure 4, blue curve).” and “In short, the historical Atlantic hurricane record does **not provide** compelling evidence for a substantial greenhouse warming induced long-term increase.” There is a statement about increased intensity based on their models, but again, without a model that accurately match historical trends it’s really speculation that the model is any good. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2013, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982/100 "2013-05-15T00:56:32Z")
And you are just repeating what was granted already. You did not check the last link I made, and it seems that you can not let the straw man go: > **[What is the link between hurricanes and global warming?](https://skepticalscience.com/hurricanes-global-warming-intermediate.htm)** > > \It is unclear whether global warming is increasing hurricane frequency but there is increasing evidence that warming increases hurricane intensity.\ > [@](#): > > The question of hurricane frequency was also addressed in a study that used climate models to simulate hurricane response to warming in the North Atlantic. Increasing temperature leads to an increase in vertical wind shear which may inhibit the formation of hurricanes (Vecchi 2007). Thus, the impact of global warming on hurricane frequency is one area requiring further research and more data. Sorry, but you are indeed pushing the straw man, the reality remains, it is not a quantity issue, scientists are in agreement with that for several years already, and for the hundredth time, it is a straw man to claim that me or the scientists are talking about an increase in numbers, it is an issue of **Intensity**. Something that your quotes do not touch. > [@](#): > > To determine whether warmer temperatures affect hurricane intensity, one study began by defining the potential destructiveness of a hurricane based on the dissipation of power, integrated over the lifetime of a hurricane (Emanuel 2005). The Power Dissipation Index is found to increase since the mid-1970s, due to both longer and more intense storms. Hurricane intensity is also highly correlated with sea surface temperature. This suggests that future warming will lead to an increase in the destructive potential of tropical hurricanes. > > Hurricane Intensity (Power Dissipation Index) versus North Atlantic Sea Surface Temperature - Emmanuel 2005 > > Global satellite data since 1981 can be used to extend analysis of hurricane intensity to each ocean, looking for any trend in wind speed (Elsner 2008). Figure 3 plots the long term trend in maximum wind speed (eg - whether hurricanes are getting stronger or weaker) against different strength hurricanes. This tells us not only whether hurricanes are overall getting stronger but also how different strength hurricanes are being affected. Overall, there is a statistically significant upward trend (the horizontal red line). But more significantly, Elsner found weaker hurricanes showed little to no trend while stronger hurricanes showed a greater upward trend. In other words, stronger hurricanes are getting stronger. This means that as sea temperatures continue to rise, the number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes hitting land will inevitably increase. More on Elsner’s paper… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/climate-change-was-supposed-to-spawn-monster-storms-what-happened/657982.md?page=6)