Hurricanes, Global Warming, and Politically-Inspired Fear-Mongering
As another major hurricane bears down on the Gulf Coast, a prominent environmentalist is clamoring to link what appears to be an uptick in storm activity to global warming.
Reuters is quoting British scientist Sir John Lawton, of the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution, as saying:
“The increased intensity of these kinds of extreme storms is very likely to be due to global warming,” Lawton told the newspaper in an interview.
“If this makes the climate loonies in the States realize we’ve got a problem, some good will come out of a truly awful situation,” said Lawton.
This is politically-motivated fear-mongering and shameless grandstanding — and there is zero science to support Lawton’s claim. We simply don’t know yet if global warming could be causing this apparent increase in hurricanes.
As the working climate scientists say on the excellent blog RealClimate:
…there is no way to prove that Katrina either was, or was not, affected by global warming. For a single event, regardless of how extreme, such attribution is fundamentally impossible. We only have one Earth, and it will follow only one of an infinite number of possible weather sequences. It is impossible to know whether or not this event would have taken place if we had not increased the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere as much as we have. Weather events will always result from a combination of deterministic factors (including greenhouse gas forcing or slow natural climate cycles) and stochastic factors (pure chance).
Due to this semi-random nature of weather, it is wrong to blame any one event such as Katrina specifically on global warming - and of course it is just as indefensible to blame Katrina on a long-term natural cycle in the climate.
(Emphatic emphasis mine.)
i have heard this argument over and over. the incessant argument that global warming is NOT a cause of the increased storm activity is just as much political mongering as saying it is. while i don’t completely agree with your second quotation, it seems much more on target however it does tend to turn a blind eye to what effect humans may be having on the climate.
my gut feeling based on five or six years of paying special attention to this through my college years and afterwards is that global warming does exist. and it does affect the intensity of these storms. i’m not so sure the frequency is affected, i’m not sure how to really measure that (at least statistically separating it out from the natural cycle in the frequency of storms). and there is some science to show that the intensities can be affected. over the past 10 years, the deep ocean temperature levels have risen almost a full degree (one of the key pieces of evidence for global warming). this rise in temperature is exaggerated on the surface, with the loss of the insulating effects of the water above it. what is the main source of fuel for a hurricane? warm water, 86 degrees farenheit and above. it is having an effect.
i think what you are seeing from the likes of Sir John Lawton is frustration that not only are people not listening but many are campaigning against what science is telling us (see any Fox News Channel report concerning global warming and hurricanes).
WIDTTF
23 Sep 05 at 1:32 pm
Global warming cycles are caused by solar cycles. The science is well understood. Just because someone has a Sir before their names, doesn’t mean we need to waste everyone’s time with their musings.
Rick Thomas
27 Sep 05 at 7:38 am