MIA Hurricane Season, PLUS Climate Challenge Update
I was outside this morning having my first cup of coffee and looking at the dismal progress of my tomatoes, (which are totally failing to ripen) and it got me to thinking about the odd weather we’ve been having this summer. Summer is, of course, the traditional hurricane season, but have you seen many of them in the news? I haven’t seen much about it in the blogosphere. I stopped by the National Hurricane Center to take a peek at what was coming down the pipe.
Click on the image for the full size picture and you’ll get a bit of a surprise. On August 9, in the height of the season, the Atlantic is looking as calm as a mill pond. There is zero cyclonic activity at the moment. True, there is a typhoon moving toward Taiwan this morning and we had one Pacific hurricane that briefly looked like it was heading for Hawaii, but it turned North and completely fizzled.
By contrast, here is a map of the hurricane tracks from the infamous summer of 2005, just four years ago. (Again, click on the image for the full map.) In the hot season from the last week of July until the first week of September, we saw twelve storms, with seven of them reaching hurricane strength including the historic Katrina. What the heck is going on here?
Sure, we could go with the easy and most obvious answer. God clearly hated George W. Bush but smiles benevolently upon Barack Obama, so we were beaten up during the last administration and will be kept safe now that our new President is in office. But the most obvious explanation isn’t always the right one. Could it be something else?
Here’s a brief look at the number of hurricane force storms we’ve had in the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico over the last fifteen years. (Yet again, click for full size.) You can combine that with the long term numbers over the period of time when we’ve been keeping records. From 1957 until today, the annual average has increased, but that increase is less than one for any given year. Going back to the last graph, if we can draw one conclusion, it’s that we generally get a different number of hurricanes from year to year and that number swings all over the place. The average will slowly change, but not by much. There does seem to be a marked increase over the estimated numbers in the 1800′s, but keep in mind that we didn’t exactly have satellites back then. We only knew about the ones that either hit our shores or came within sight of ships that survived to tell the tale. A fair number of Atlantic storms each year swerve north and dissipate without ever coming near land.
While we’re on the subject of weather this weekend, I wanted to give you an update on Nate Silver’s Global Warming Challenge. When last we checked on July 18, I was in the lead over Nate by $400. That included June, from the start of summer and a bit less than three weeks of July. Now we can finish up July and add in the first eight days of August as well. The tally now stands at:
Jazz: (Days where high temp was below avg.) 38
Nate: (Days where high temp was above avg.) 8
Tie: (Days where the high temp matched the avg. high) 3
So in our hypothetical bet, I’m now up on Nate by 30 days, so I’m $750 to the good. Does this mean the planet is or isn’t getting warmer? No. It means it’s a rather cool and rainy summer where I live, which happens from time to time and messes up my gardening schedule. And we’ve thus far had exactly one unnamed tropical depression in the Atlantic since the season began. Does this mean that the global menace of hurricanes has finally been defeated? No. We’re just getting lucky this year, as we do from time to time. Next year could be worse or it could be even better. And if you think you already know what will happen next season… you don’t.
Enjoy your Sunday, everyone.
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20 Responses to “MIA Hurricane Season, PLUS Climate Challenge Update”
When the water molecule changes states it releases or absorbs a lot of heat depending on if it's moving from liquid to solid [ice] or to gas [steam/clouds/rain]. The water molecule is a funny bird in that it has a relatively high specific heat; which is a given substances need for heat or the release thereof to change phases from liquid to solid to gas and even plasma [next stage after gas].
With ice melting at the polar caps we would expect, I would think, a situation in the interim that mimicked a cooling trend wherein as the ice absorbs the excess heat the Earth has in order to melt and turn ultimately into clouds we would experience wetter weather initially and cooling trends in some spots. My fear is that once we lose enough ice we will run into a rapid and deadly increase in heat that no longer will be buffered by ice caps melting. Those ice caps going away are going to kill more than just polar bears.
There is a growing El Nino which helps keep up wind sheer and thus reduce hurricanes.
However there is also an increase in typhoons, so let's be glad we're not in Asia right now.
Well Jazz, While you were cool and wet we here in the normaly cool and gray Pacific NW obliterated the old record for continous days above 90, tied the old record for continous days above 100 and tied the second highest temperature ever (106) two days in a row. Our precipitation is down over a third from normal. And mikkel is right – el Nino is a hurricane killer in the gulf and a hurricane maker in the Eastern Pacific.
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I guess this sort of identifies the problem I have with the Global Warming subject, it's more meme than science. Here's a couple quotes from past dire predictions:
“In the latest study, published today in the journal Science, a team led by Peter Webster, of the Georgia Institute of Technology, analysed all the satellite records of hurricanes and typhoons since 1970.
“What we found was rather astonishing,” he said. “In the 1970s, there was an average of about 10 Category 4 and 5 hurricanes per year. Since 1990, the number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes has almost doubled, averaging 18 per year.”
The Times – 9/16/05
“Recent scientific evidence suggests a link between the destructive power (or intensity) of hurricanes and higher ocean temperatures, driven in large part by global warming. With rapid population growth in coastal regions placing many more people and structures in the path of these tropical cyclones there is a much greater risk of casualties, property damage, and financial hardship when these storms make landfall. (1)”Union of Concerned Scientists: Citizens and Scientists for Environmental Solutions – no date given
Four years ago, these headlines were blared across both traditional and web media as the latest “evidence” of GW's dire consequences. So now that storms are not showing up, we hear in comments all the reasons why this doesn't contradict the GW theory. When it gets hot locally, it proves it's GW, when the seas are placid, it proves its GW. Sea temps have continued to rise since these headlines, so where's the storms that must occur if the current simplistic theory is accurate?
GW is hypothesized to be cause by growing CO2 levels. The levels have continued to grow, but temperatures fluctuate dramatically. If the relationship is so explicit, why the variation? Could it be that “Concerned scientists” simply don't understand the complexity of our climate? All I am pointing out is that Aristotle was sure he understood how the solar system was arranged, and the vast majority of educated men believed it was so.
I am questioning the current certainty and lack of objectivity. It seems we are repeatedly told why things didn't occur as predicted. When the predictions start occurring prior to events, you will begin to form an actionable scientific hypothesis.
So…Jazz…are ya gonna take Nate's challenge all the way through the winter, too? Something tells me he'll catch up. =)
HemmD, you're actually completely wrong. At the time — 2005 — all the climatologists (and myself repeatedly on this website) repeated over and over and over:
Global warming is not predicted to affect the number of hurricanes, it is merely expected to cause stronger hurricanes when they do form.
NOAA released several press releases saying the same thing. (There is actually a 30-40 year cycle of hurricane activity that I've never heard an explanation of why that occurs, but we just entered the higher period recently…again that's on average not discounting El Nino and such)
Also, the number 1 factor in hurricane formation is wind sheer. Once a hurricane develops, then it feeds off sea surface temperature, and at some point it starts to affect the atmosphere and create its own favorable conditions, but in a high wind sheer environment there will be very few hurricanes. That is currently what is happening.
Similarly, when it comes to carbon dioxide levels: The year to year variation is dominated by the El Nino/La Nina cycle. In fact, it accounts for the vast majority of yearly variance and temperatures will stop rising or falling during the La Nina portion. However, it's the trend over the cycles that is rising. If the temperatures don't increase in the next 5 years, then I'll start to think that they are missing something major. That said, the global temperatures fell only marginally over the past cycle, which may be forming a higher base.
Honestly your claim that the stuff over the last few years was not predicted is just wrong, and part of it is because the popular perception of what “scientists think” isn't accurate at all.
Another factor that affects hurricane formation, at least according to some recent studies, is the weather in Africa. If they've had a dry season that causes more dust to be picked up by the prevailing winds and blown into the Atlantic it can cause a reduction in hurricane formation.
mikkel
All I did was pull quotes from five years ago. If those statements were wrong, blame them. You now say it's wind shear, they said severity was due to increased ocean temps. Has wind shear suddenly been discovered as the moderating influence to more and stronger storms? No article from five years ago mentioned your current belief.
Do any of the models used by the IPCC factor in La Nina? Did their models predict the drop in temperatures caused by the recurring cooling? I don't believe they did. There was no discussion of a predicted drop, not here or on TV. Funny, but the predictions have kept pointing up year after year without the variation you now speak of.
I'm not saying it may be getting climatically warmer, I'm just saying the confidence of doom shows no correlating caution. When predictions and models start demonstrating the ability to look ahead, I'll buy in.
“If the temperatures don't increase in the next 5 years, then I'll start to think that they are missing something major.”
They missed the current leveling five years ago, so why don't you consider that fact now?
No, the article from 5 years ago is absolutely correct. I will highlight the part that is relevant.
“What we found was rather astonishing,” he said. “In the 1970s, there was an average of about 10 Category 4 and 5 hurricanes per year. Since 1990, the number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes has almost doubled, averaging 18 per year.”
Again, they aren't talking about total number, they are talking about the most powerful hurricanes.
OK I have to agree that that quoted statement is a bad one because really they need to talk about percentage of hurricanes that are the top two levels, since the number is an independent variable, it may be a bad comparison to say double if the number has doubled. However, if you look it up, you'll see that until the first couple of years this decade, the number since 1950 was relatively consistent, so it is percentage.
The IPcc report looks at climate not weather. Their data looks at smoothed data which is over 15 years if the same as NOAA.
All the climatologists have said that the effects of El Nino/La Nina on the yearly scale are nearly impossible to model with our present understanding (they can just talk about variance and direction), so when they are talking about warming it's just a given that it's not on that scale, but the smoothed one.
“They missed the current leveling five years ago, so why don't you consider that fact now?”
They didn't miss the current leveling, we had La Nina right as expected. The reason why I said five years from now, is that 5 years ago we were near the end of the expected El Nino cycle and about to enter La Nina which meant that the next 3-4 years should be cooler or flat…which it was.
Also 1998 was the hottest single year due to short term effects, so in 5 years it will be about 15 years since then which is the time scale that they filter on…and it will incorporate another full El Nino cycle, so if there is true flattening of climatological time scale temperature it will show up then. That makes sense?
Global Warming: The end or lessoning of weather activity, or, an increase of it? I don’t know but I believe it safe to say that it will take a heck-of-a-lot longer to refreeze the poles that it is taking to melt them.
Don't feel bad Jazz, my tomatoes are slow to ripen this year too. I'm sure they are all going to come on at once though and I'll be giving them away like crazy. As for global warming? I wish there wasn't so much evidence for it. It would be nice to imagine we humans were incapable of having that sort of impact on this beautiful planet and that it could endlessly bounce back from all the assaults we make on it.
Thanks for response.
I believe our conversations are passing icebergs in the night. You specified that the IPCC deals with climate, not weather. That was one of my points.
Climate variation over 5 or ten years or (even a hundred) is statistically insignificant when trying to deduce trends. Indeed, if a trend in temperature rise is to be examined, then just take a look at a graph of the steady upward trend since the last ice age.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ice_Age_…
Hansen et al have based their projections on weather data since the little ice age. That certainly can skew current warming trends. If one looks at the record for the last few million years, however, the current warming is just a continuation of a natural rhythmic cycle. Why would the upper end of this latest warming trend by statistically significant or proof that man is cause of the warming?
Compounding this issue is the fact that almost all the news we hear is sensationalistic drivel. Hot weather here means global warming. Cool weather here means I'm looking at the weather, not the climate. The politics hide the science.
There are many other examples of problems I see in the methodology being used, but this is not the correct venue for that kind of discussion. Besides, you no doubt have little time to walk me through these questions.
I will say I have visited a couple of the local weather stations used to collect data, and concrete, brick, and air conditioning ducts within a few feet certainly hasn't been “smoothed” out of our current weather data.
Thanks
Haha well I can't let it go fully so I'll just be brief. The consensus is that the bulk of warming is due to the natural trend, but that the rate can't be explained by it. Over the next hundred years, if it rises by 2 degrees then 60% of that is projected to be natural and 40% added to by human activities. However, the effects are exponential, and it's projected that the human component will make things 5-10x worse when you factor in amount of people displaced or affected on a survival level.
Also, regardless of how you feel about climate change science in general, you leveled very specific accusations that aren't correct and then just changed the argument instead of admitting that. Accepting that things have acted in line with the consensus understanding over the last few years shouldn't affect your larger argument, and just because the popular perception is hyperventilatory (in both directions) doesn't mean that the scientists are….they have had entire conferences on trying to figure out how to get more accurate information to be popularly understood, including the things I brought up.
Remarkable.
You state with confidence that going forward, 60% of warming is natural and 40% is man-made. And based upon the fact that we have limited accurate data going back 5 million years, how can you with a straight face state we're sure it’s a 60/40 split if year over year data only goes back 100 years?
Where is your proof, scientifically speaking? I mean how do you know 2 degrees in a hundred year period should only be 1.2 degrees. During which century 50000 years ago did we find that 1.2 degree increase was normal? Your confidence is exactly what I find disturbing.
You make my point for me. The variation in the trend over the next hundred years is exactly the same logic used when people are scorned for citing temperature rises or declines on a year to year basis. Over the past 100,000, the trend is upward and any hundred year variation should be “smoothed” the same way measured temps are adjusted in the current context.
Let me restate from my first entry:
“I am questioning the current certainty and lack of objectivity. It seems we are repeatedly told why things didn't occur as predicted. When the predictions start occurring prior to events, you will begin to form an actionable scientific hypothesis.”
This was my original complaint, and I stand by that.
I didn't mean to say that I had confidence in those numbers, I'm saying that is what the consensus is.
You make a false equivalency though because you are talking about everything like it is a random process with some sort of variance…that's not the case and it is clearly shown in the long term reconstructions. Smoothing over 15 years makes sense because of the dynamics of the system and that it captures (on average) two full El Nino/La Nina cycles. So no, the variation over the next hundred years is not necessarily the same logic at all when talking about a year to year basis unless there are other dynamics at stake which would make it so (of which I will agree that the temporal resolution of the long term data is probably not great enough to see if that is the case! Although I'm not certain because it's beyond my knowledge.)
“It seems we are repeatedly told why things didn't occur as predicted. When the predictions start occurring prior to events, you will begin to form an actionable scientific hypothesis.”
They did occur as *expected* but there weren't any predictions made about the last couple of years. If you go to realclimate.org and look at the 80s predictions, you will see that they were rather accurate.
Again, I have not said anything to contradict your beliefs about the long term behavior or causes at all. I have merely stated when you said things that were blatantly incorrect or statements that were of the “ah I bet they haven't thought of that!” type when they had and I pointed out their current consensus about how much of an effect it has. The consensus was built up by investigating the actual dynamics to the best that they measured, and the understanding of the dynamics is what you are discounting by making inaccurate statements or false conclusions that don't apply to the type of system that the climate operates as.
mikkel
“You make a false equivalency though because you are talking about everything like it is a random process with some sort of variance…that's not the case and it is clearly shown in the long term reconstructions.”
The equivalency is just, because the process is not random, it is unknown. The same upward trend seen for the past hundred thousand years is now considered different due to man's influence. For that case to be made, GW theorists must “normalize” data so that year over year variance is smoothed. Over 15 years, that may make statistical sense, but over 100k years, the last 15 years shouldn't be normalized in the same fashion? Variation is a function defined by the amount of time referenced in a studied trend. Attributing a percentage of predicted change into natural and man-made percentages is poppycock, no matter how mant people reach consensus.
“The consensus was built up by investigating the actual dynamics to the best that they measured, and the understanding of the dynamics is what you are discounting by making inaccurate statements or false conclusions that don't apply to the type of system that the climate operates as.”
I won't do more than comment that consensus and scientific methodology have little in common. And the best of their measuring ability also begs a discussion of ground station accuracy. Have you seen the weather stations now surrounded by brick, asphalt and air conditioning ducts? I have.
Suffice it to say you wish to elieve that scientists have been able to model the climate system accurately enough to predict dire consequences, I have seen no modeling proof of that conjecture, and to this point in time, neither have you.
Thanks again.
Considering they can't even reliably tell you what the weather's going to be like this weekend, should we really be surprised their forecast for the season was off?
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