I’m sure everybody’s noticed all the hurricanes lately. They seem to be getting more frequent and they’re getting meaner. One cannot help but wonder how much effect global warming is having on these things. There also seems to be a growing consensus that the warming of the oceans is amping these things up.
Sir John Lawton, the environmental chief of Britain, is calling Katrina and Rita the “smoking gun” evidence for Global warming. He has also had some rather harsh words for what he calls “climate loonies” in the US who deny the threat of Global Warming.
Now I admit that I’m no climatologist but it seems like the people that know this stuff are fairly solid on the conclusion that GW exists and that it’s affecting the weather.
So let’s talk about this. How much do we really have to worry? Are we looking at a future where hurricane seasons are going to become worse and worse? If so, will that wake people up to GW, and is there anything we can do about now? I’m really glad I live in the middle of a continent but I’m getting pretty anxious about seasons to come. Am I too worried, or am I not worried enough?
I thought the general idea was that there are cycles of calm and then violent hurricanes in the Atlantic (IIRC, around 30-40 years per cycle) and we are now entering a violent period. Unfortunately, I haven’t heard any name for this type of cycle so I can’t search for more information on this very easily.
It would take an enormous amount of energy to raise the ocean temperature by one degree (C?), though.
You’ve seen that big burning thing in the sky? The oceans have already warmed one degree and will continue warming. Ocean temp affects hurricane strength therefore whatever cycles are in place are irrelevant to some extent because global warming will give them a kick. Violent and frequent become even more violent (don’t know about frequent).
I was listening to an interview with an expert on Radio 4 this morning; he said that hurricanes are associated with warm ocean temperatures (I don’t think anyone actually disputes this bit), and that there is a range of different conditions that results in a proportional range of different severities of hurricane.
It may be that the range ‘maxes out’ at a certain level, so that further increases don’t result in proportionally greater severity, but what global warning will do is to reset the baseline of that range to a higher level - so that the conditions resulting in the more severe hurricanes will be more likely to occur.
I’m no climatologist either, but I’ve not seen a consensus emerge from those folks who are experts that global warming (something I don’t even think all the ‘experts’ agree on…or at least agree on what it means) is the direct cause of the current crop of hurricanes…or even that global warming will cause more hurricanes, or more intense hurricanes for that matter (I’ve heard SOME ‘experts’ say either of those, and some say neither, i.e. no consensus).
Here is an article posted on CNN that briefly talks about some of the issues:
As with Global Warming itself, we just don’t have enough of a grasp yet on the actual science of how the weather works to be able to make accurate predictions. Theories that global warming are triggering more hurricanes, or more intense hurricanes are just that…theories. Perhaps they are true, perhaps not. Only more data is going to work out the pesky details that will prove or disprove those theories one way or another. Sort of like the more data necessary to prove out global warming itself, the human factor, and what it all means…and to be able to make accurate predictions of what the real world effects are going to be.
The OP offers a cittaion that begins with the (correct) statement: “Scientists say one season, even like this one, cannot indicate anything about climate change.”
He then goes on to argue that this season says something about climate change.
Climate is not weather. Weather is not climate.
Global warming, to the extent it exists, is a climate change.
The hurricane season this year is weather.
We may not infer anything, one way or the other, from this year’s hurricanes alone. Period. They are irrelevant. They tell us nothing.
It’s unlcear what the effect of GW will be on hurricanes in general, since a warming in the Pacific (El Nino) acts to suppress hurricanes in the Atlantic. I’m not sure what this means for cyclones (hurricanes in the Pacific), but Atlantic hurricanes could be fewer in number even if higher in intensity.
A rise in sea levels due to the melting ice caps is a bigger problem for coastal cities, since the impact is permanent (in the sense that you can’t just pump out the water as in NOLA right now) and you needn’t be in a hurricane prone area for this to be a problem.
No need to go on at this point. If one does a google search on ‘Hurricanes Global Warming’ most of the articles on the first page either outright debunk to notion, or at least argue against it.
no they don’t but as the Science magazine article shows (sorry link is behind a subscription firewall or something) that while the overall trend for Cat 1-3 hurricanes is heading down in the last 5 years, the trend for 4 and 5’s is going up.
From latest Science magazine (quoted from a pdf so excuse the formatting)
Is Katrina a Harbinger of Still
More Powerful Hurricanes?
Not conclusive by any means but how many cities do we want flooded or flattened, how many multi-billion dollar repair bills do we want to pay before we start taking global warming seriously?
The actual data (this from a recent Science article) show that hurricanes are indeed more intense.
Of course correlation and consistency with modelling is not proof that global warming is the culprit. Could be coincidental. But the facts are that surface water temperature drives hurricane intensity, that global warming is increasing surface water temperaturres, and that hurricanes are consistently increasing in magnitude over the past thirty years. Couple this with demogaphics of more people in coastland communities and we do not have a pretty picture. This season of Katrina and Rita are unlikely to be atypical in the future.
You’re pointing out the one bit of information on that site that has the least to do with answering the question posed. Nobody is really concerned with “United States warming due to greenhouse gas emissions,” right? It’s global warming we’re all talking about.
Likewise, counting the number of hurricanes that hit the US doesn’t really bear much information about whether or not greater numbers and more powerful hurricanes are hitting Mexico, Central America, or South America. If there’s a graph that shows the number of hurricanes in the world, and their strength, then we’re talking.
No I didn’t. I quoted a top British scientist who said that this hurricane season was proof of Global Warming but I offered no personal opinion as to whether he was right.
That’s fine, but I wasn’t asking whether we could infer anything from this one season. I was asking what effect GW has on hurricanes, an entirely different question. To me the most relevant, quantifiable factor is the warming of the ocean. There doesn’t seem to be any scientific dissent on the point that the surface temperature of the ocean adds more energy and increases the intensity of hurricanes. Of course it would be fallacious to take one season and try to extropolate what future seasons will be like, but that’s not what I did. My question is basically whether the warming of the ocean is souping up Cat 2 and 3 hurricanes into Cat 4’s and 5’s and whether that’s a trend that’s likely to continue.
Er…good point. My assumption was that they were talking about a regional study, but only showing part of that study effecting the US. However there really is nothing there to back up that assumption. If I have the time I’ll see if there is a broader graph showing hurricane/tropical storm frequency/severity for the past century or so.
Even accepting XT’s premises at face value, there’s an unspoken argument here, as used by some (not necessarily XT):
Yes, and until then let’s let big biz pollute the shit out of everything because everybody knows it’s stupid to try and anticipate problems and prevent them.
To which the counter-argument seems to be, “The better response is to shut down all American industry on the mere possibility that what we’re doing is harmful in any way.”
Come now. Nobody advocates that. Cutting back on carbon dioxide emissions = shutting down all American industry in what respect? And who advocates that only America should do so? Nobody that I ever heard of. What exactly were the Kyoto accords about if not a global response? And how did the American leadership respond to the Kyoto accords?
First, I think it fair to point out that the article you link to and cite is from 1999. Since then scientists have found some of the flaws in the data collection that made global warming “suspect”. The majority of the data indicate that global warming is an actual phenomenon.
Now, whether or not global warming is the cause of the increased hurricane activity is still debatable and certainly not a given. Maybe it is just a “cycle”, maybe not. I’d guess that we don’t have enough data to prove that cycles are true or if there is some other cause.
But here’s something I just don’t get. Whether or not it’s actually attributable to global warming, what is the harm in trying to address and reduce some of the believed causes of global warming? It will likely have increased costs, which are knowable and quantifiable, but it seems a huge risk to wait and see if soon all coastal areas of the southeast are uninhabitable because we want to wait for all of the data to come in. We can certainly work on reducing reliance on fossil fuels, and now have stronger economic incentives to do so, not the least of which is that OUR RELIANCE ON MIDDLE EAST OIL IS FUNDING THE TERRORISTS. We can take steps to scrub and clean smokestack emissions and their are immediate benefits, a possible secondary benefit being reduced mercury emissions. We KNOW that mercury is poisonous and it’s believed to be a very dangerous long term health risk. We can also start now to take other measures, such as using lighter road materials, to reduce possible atmospheric temperature increases.
I’d rather do the above and find out we were wrong about global warming’s influence on hurricanes than to do nothing and find out that we were right, perhaps to late to do anything substantive about it.
Here is a list of Atlantic Category 5 Hurricanes. Link They are pretty spaced out over the years except for the last year & 1960-61. There were 4 Cat 5 hurricanes from Sept 1960 - October 1961. While global warming may have something to do with the recent hurricanes, a few big storms close together is not unprecedented.