September 5, 2008 | Posted by Sheryl Canter in Extreme Weather
Have Hurricanes Gustav and Hanna gotten you thinking about the possible link between hurricanes and climate change?
Check out our hurricane and clilmate change overview for the straight facts from EDF climate scientists. And Peter Black shares eye-opening maps over on ClimateAtlas.
This post is by Sheryl Canter, an online writer and editorial manager at Environmental Defense Fund.
February 7, 2008 | Posted by Lisa Moore in Extreme Weather
This post is by Lisa Moore, Ph.D., a scientist in the Climate and Air program at Environmental Defense.
Yesterday, an unusually ferocious winter tornado system killed at least 55 people in five Southern states, and destroyed over a thousand homes and businesses. Usually tornadoes touch down for 20 minutes then come back up, but these were rare "long-track" tornadoes that stayed on the ground for 30 to 50 miles.
Lots of recent research indicates that global warming increases the intensity of hurricanes. Could it also affect tornadoes? It's too early to tell, but scientists are starting to look.
January 28, 2008 | Posted by Lisa Moore in Extreme Weather
This post is by Lisa Moore, Ph.D., a scientist in the Climate and Air program at Environmental Defense.
Last week, scientists published a study about global warming and hurricanes in the U.S. The authors found a weak downward trend in the number of landfalling U.S. hurricanes, but concluded that future trends will depend on the spatial distribution of ocean warming.
In its coverage of the study, the Miami Herald said that "global warming actually is diminishing the number of hurricanes that strike Florida and the rest of the United States - and the phenomenon is likely to continue." This is not exactly what the study said. Here's the full scoop.
October 16, 2007 | Posted by Sheryl Canter in Extreme Weather
The author of today's post is Sheryl Canter, an Online Writer and Editorial Manager at Environmental Defense.
It's been raining a lot in some parts of the world. In Northern India, Bangladesh, and Nepal, the worst rains in decades have devastated tea and rice crops, killed at least 3000 to 4000 people, and affected tens of millions of people since June. Great tracts of land are under water. Crop land has been destroyed; people are hungry. And the weather forecast says rain.
Click image to view original page.
Torrential rains also have caused severe flooding in Korea, Uganda, and Sudan. In North Korea, over 600 people are dead or missing, 170,000 people displaced, and almost 1 million people affected. In Sudan, 200,000 are homeless from floods. India, itself reeling, sent $250,000 in aid to flood-ravaged Uganda.
Is this all from global warming?
July 27, 2007 | Posted by Bill Chameides in Extreme Weather
The author of today's post, Bill Chameides, Ph.D., is Chief Scientist at Environmental Defense.
A week or so ago I wrote about all the recent extreme weather in the United States. Well, it's not just happening here. Great Britain is being hit by the worst flooding in decades, and it keeps on raining. A heatwave blanketing south-eastern Europe has killed hundreds of people, and out-of-control wildfires are burning across Greece.
Is this global warming? It's impossible to say for sure what causes a particular weather event, but global warming does make extreme weather events more likely. Whether or not the events in Europe are due to global warming, I do think the Europeans are, unfortunately, getting a taste of things to come. For more, visit our Web page on global warming and extreme weather.
July 17, 2007 | Posted by Bill Chameides in Extreme Weather
With all that's going on in the world, it's easy to miss weather events. So you may not have noticed that U.S. weather patterns the last few months have been quite extreme and worrying.
June 13, 2007 | Posted by Bill Chameides in Extreme Weather
Today's post is by Bill Chameides, Chief Scientist at Environmental Defense.
The hurricane season began on June 1, and we are all waiting with some dread to see what this year will bring. Will it be a relatively mild season like last year, a devastating one like 2005, or something in between? An ominous sign is that we have already seen two tropical storms in the region: Andrea, which formed almost a month before the season began, and Barry, which formed on the first day of the season.
Last week I read that Oman was hit by Tropical Cyclone Gonu. ("Hurricane", "typhoon", and "cyclone" are all names for the same thing.) I know that Asia and Australia are regularly hit by tropical storms, but the Arabian Peninsula? Is that normal? I didn't know, so I decided to do a little investigating. Here's what I learned.
June 1, 2007 | Posted by Lisa Moore in Extreme Weather, Plants & Animals
Guest blogger Lisa Moore, Ph.D., is a scientist in the Climate and Air Program.
Last week, Bill summarized two new studies about carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere and ocean. This week brought three very different topics: hurricanes (quite timely, since today is the first day of the Atlantic hurricane season!), global rainfall patterns and rainbow trout.
May 30, 2007 | Posted by Bill Chameides in Extreme Weather
If you're concerned about hurricanes and global warming and you've been reading the newspapers and magazines, you are probably confused.
Perhaps in an effort to be "balanced," most stories in the media these days present a muddled picture. Cornelia Dean's piece in the New York Times is a good case in point: a scientific paper is cited claiming a connection; another is cited claiming the opposite. The implication is that the science is inconclusive.
April 16, 2007 | Posted by Lisa Moore in Extreme Weather
Lisa Moore is a scientist in the Climate and Air Program in Environmental Defense's New York office. Along with principal author Jennifer Kefer, colleague Tim Searchinger and the National Wildlife Federation’s David Conrad, she is a co-author of the new report "America's Flood Risk is Heating Up."
This weekend's monster nor'easter prompted flood warnings and evacuations from the Carolinas to Maine. And what ironic timing: last week, as the storm wreaked havoc in the South, Environmental Defense and the National Wildlife Federation released a report detailing how the Army Corps of Engineers' flood-control program needs to be completely re-vamped [PDF], especially in light of climate change.
While helping draft the report, I was struck by two things in particular.
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