The same issue has played out in discussions
of hurricane trends in a warming world.
Not exact matches
But
hurricanes are also influenced and steered by massive global
trends in weather that are hard to predict: The warming or cooling
of waters in the Pacific (El Niño and La Niña) and patterns like the Madden - Julian oscillation (an eastward - moving weather system that circles the globe every month or so and makes thunderstorms more likely) all play a role.
The pattern isn't as evident in the northern Atlantic Ocean as it is in the southern Indian Ocean and the southern Pacific Ocean, but if the
trend continues, it means more intense
hurricanes in places
of greater population.
«Even if we take the extreme
of these error estimates, we are left with a significant
trend since 1890 and a significant
trend in major
hurricanes starting anytime before 1920,» say atmospheric scientists Greg Holland
of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., and Peter Webster
of the Georgia Institute
of Technology in Atlanta.
Hurricane Irene is part
of a worsening
trend.
The relatively short time period
of quality
hurricane records makes detecting such
trends difficult, though.
Globally, estimates
of the potential destructiveness
of hurricanes show a significant upward
trend since the mid-1970s, with a
trend towards longer lifetimes and greater storm intensity, and such
trends are strongly correlated with tropical SST.
If we think
of hurricanes as Stirling heat engines, then we realize that the two reservoirs are the mixed layer
of the surface ocean (1) and the upper atmosphere (2); note that there is a general
trend of stratospheric cooling as well.
Some point to periods
of intense
hurricane activity in Earth's past and worry that such
trends may return.
Since the mid 1970's, global estimates
of the potential destructiveness
of hurricanes show an upward
trend strongly correlated with increasing tropical sea - surface temperature.
When you add in climate
trends including sea level rise, which can increase the height
of storm surge, and projections
of fewer but more intense
hurricanes, you have a recipe for increased vulnerability and losses in these regions in the future.
Ms. Martinez and I often joke that we've outlasted most
of our friends» marriages, not to mention presidential administrations, health care reforms,
hurricanes and fashion
trends.
When I adopted two kittens from a shelter a couple
of weeks ago — both as adorable as anything can possibly be, but with the relentless destructive energy
of two tiny
hurricanes — I didn't realize that I was bucking a
trend: America's pet population is dropping, apparently (like so many things today) a casualty
of our uncertain economy.
According to the most recent evidence, there does not seem to be any sort
of trend toward more
hurricane activity and the signal for a possible increase in intensity is weak.
You write that Emanuel's study shows a
trend in the «intrinsic destructive potential
of hurricanes».
He writes: «the data
of landfalling
hurricanes in the U.S. is less than a tenth
of a percent
of the data for global
hurricanes over their whole lifetimes», and shows that from such a small subset
of data and given the amount
of natural variability, there is no way you would be able to detect a
trend by now.
Bouwer and Botzen (2011) demonstrated that other normalized records
of total economic and insured losses for the same series
of hurricanes exhibit no significant
trends in losses since 1900.»]-RSB-
If one examines our model's control simulations for the 1982 - 2006 period, which show a
trend towards increasing
hurricane activity over this period, and correlates this activity with SST in the Main Development Region, and then tries to use this correlation to predict the 21st century behavior
of the model, it clearly doesn't work.
Overall, there appears to have been a substantial 100 - year
trend leading to related increases
of over 0.78 C in SST and over 100 % in tropical cyclone and
hurricane numbers.
Roughly a year ago, we summarized the state
of play in the ongoing scientific debate over the role
of anthropogenic climate change in the observed
trends in
hurricane activity.
When discussing the influence
of anthropogenic global warming on
hurricane or tropical cyclone (TC) frequency and intensity (see e.g. here, here, and here), it is important to examine observed past
trends.
4:38 p.m. Updated I read Mark Fischetti's piece on global warming and
hurricanes in Scientific American just now, which points to a recent PNAS study finding «a statistically significant
trend in the frequency
of large surge events» from tropical cyclones in the Atlantic.
This is an unmistakable upward
trend in
hurricane activity — the activity
of the last 10 seasons is about 150 % that
of the historical average.
Some have even gone so far as to state that this study proves that recent
trends in
hurricane activity are part
of a natural cycle.
As we have discussed elsewhere on this site, statistical measures that focus on
trends in the strongest category storms, maximum
hurricane winds, and changes in minimum central pressures, suggest a systematic increase in the intensities
of those storms that form.
From a strictly non-policy oriented point
of view, using
hurricanes to ID a global warming
trend is a bit like using dinosaur fossils to determine the Cretaceous - Triassic geological boundary.
``... we estimate that it would take at least another 50 years to detect any long - term
trend in U.S. landfalling
hurricane statistics, so powerful is the role
of chance in these numbers.»
Does that indicate acceptance
of a global - warming related
trend in
hurricane intensity in the North Atlantic?
I guess the question in this case (referring to comment # 33 regarding whether there really has been a
trend and the reference to Michaels and
hurricane loss) boils down to weighing the normalisation
of hurricane loss (used to adjust the
trends in total
hurricane loss) against the calculations by Emanuel as well as the degree
of representativeness in this case.
Moreover, as each
hurricane season is relatively short, it is especially susceptible to the caprices
of «weather», i.e., a season may be strong or weak due to a particular weather pattern that is just a few weeks long and that does not reflect any long - term
trend whatever.
Mooney describes the debate over the role
of natural vs. anthropogenic factors in observed tropical warming
trends that have been related to increased
hurricane activity, and there is a fair amount
of discussion
of the partisanship that high - level NOAA administrators have apparently taken in this debate.
All previous and current research in the area
of hurricane variability has shown no reliable, long - term
trend up in the frequency or intensity
of tropical cyclones, either in the Atlantic or any other basin.
So while it may provide a dramatic example
of the apparent
trend in
hurricane intensity and / or frequency, it neither defines nor demonstrates that
trend.
Tropical North Atlantic SST has exhibited a warming
trend of ~ 0.3 °C over the last 100 years; whereas Atlantic
hurricane activity has not exhibited trendlike variability, but rather distinct multidecadal cycles as documented here and elsewhere.
There are certainly better indicators
of global warming
trends — ice sheet volume, sea ice extent and sea surface temperatures all come to mind — but
hurricanes get people's attention.
You can make your own list, I am sure — the retreat
of the Arctic ice last summer, Greenland melt,
trends in Atlantic
hurricanes over the past 20 years, etc..
While I agree with Roger Pielke, Jr. that settlement
trends are the primary cause
of increases in US
hurricane damages, I do not agree that resettlement should be pursued «instead
of» reduction
of GHG emissions.
To conclude — I will add that the investigators
of the re-analysis project had the following conclusion for Cycles
of hurricane activity: These records reflect the existence
of cycles
of hurricane activity, rather than
trends toward more frequent or stronger
hurricanes.
[ANDY REVKIN notes: One reason for the statistical gridlock is the murkiness
of the data on the things that matter most (
hurricane trends over the past century, for instance).
We've criticized NOAA
Hurricane Center folks before on certain issues (e.g. their attribution
of recent Tropical Cyclone
trends to the «AMO») but on this issue they are quite sound.
Click on the animated sequence
of National
Hurricane Center forecasts to see the easterly
trend.)
Don Keiller — as others have pointed out, that paper doesn't attempt to address the issue
of the recent increase in Atlantic
hurricane intensity, or the ongoing increasing
trend of increasing sea surface temperatures and atmospheric moisture content.
- temperature
trends are unprecedented in the last 2000 years - temperatures are unprecedented in 10000000 years -
hurricane PDI has doubled in the last 30 years - GCMs are the best proof we have
of the inevitability
of CO2 - caused warming
of 3 ± 1 °C
«No robust
trends in annual numbers
of tropical storms,
hurricanes and major
hurricanes counts have been identified over the past 100 years» 3.
Winter storms and other types
of severe storms have greater uncertainties in their recent
trends and projections, compared to
hurricanes (Key Message 8).
The 2017
hurricane season fits that
trend — though there weren't more storms than usual, more
of them (10 to be exact) strengthened to become
hurricanes, matching a 124 - year - old record.
Generally yes, but there has been a lot
of new information learned since the IPCC Third Assessment Report (e.g., on
trends in
hurricane intensity, the accelerated melting back
of Arctic sea ice, the intensifying deterioration
of the edges
of the Greenland Ice Sheet, etc.) and Gore's presentation
of the science has been updated to account for these, drawing from what are the really highly reviewed and high quality papers by leading scientists.
Panelist and Colorado State University professor
of atmospheric science William M. Gray, a
hurricane authority, announced that he thinks that the biggest contributor to global warming is the fact that «we're coming out
of a little ice age,» and that the warming
trend will end in six to eight years.
In point
of fact, there is no
trend in
hurricane severity.
The US CLIVAR
Hurricane Working Group was formed to improve understanding
of interannual variability and
trends in the tropical cyclone activity from the beginning
of the 20th century to the present and quantify changes in the characteristics
of tropical cyclones under a warming climate.