It seems that the oceans of the world have become a most menacing place for humanity of late as they continue to hurl a disturbingly increasing number of deadly storms in our direction. And if this year’s hurricane season is anything like last year’s (and it looks like it will be just as bad, if not worse), expect these questions to come up more and more frequently:
Are we doing this to ourselves? Are these terrible forces of nature being spawned, or at least made significantly worse, by the phenomenon known as global warming?
I’ve done some reading, asked some questions, and gathered a good bit of data, and I have a definitive answer to those questions. The answer is “maybe.” Or, if you want me to be even more definitive, “it depends on who you ask.” The scientific community seems to be split on the issue.
Scientists who concentrate specifically on the study of hurricane behavior seem less likely to give credence to the idea that global warming is having a significant impact on the frequency and severity of ocean-borne storm systems.
They seem to believe that the current run of bad hurricane activity in the Atlantic, for example, is part of a normal 15 to 40 year cycle. We apparently got off pretty easy between 1970 and the mid 1990s as we experienced a lull in the storm cycle, and now we can expect to see increased hurricane activity for the next 5 to 30 years. Many of these hurricane experts believe that the relatively small changes in the temperature of the ocean we’ve seen in recent decades have very little effect on long-term patterns of storm activity.
On the other hand, many global climatologists disagree. Of course there are long-term patterns to hurricane activity, they assert, but the overall warming of the atmosphere is a significant variable in the storm-generating equation as well, and we ignore it at our own peril.
Warm water and moisture in the air are the stuff that hurricanes eat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. If the earth is, in fact, in a warming cycle (and it clearly is, though the exact cause is still subject to debate) these climatologists say that it should come as no surprise that ocean-borne storm systems are increasing, and will continue to increase, in frequency and severity. And if that’s the case, we may have only seen the tip of the quickly-melting iceberg when it comes to hurricanes and tsunamis.
So why can’t these scientists get on the same page? The problem is that weather phenomena are very complex to model and predict. There are a lot of variables involved, some of which are not yet completely understood. Compounding the problem is the fact that we have only recently come up with equipment that can gather detailed data on the various atmospheric forces that influence these weather systems. There simply isn’t enough good data, as yet, for solid conclusions to be drawn.
The problem is that if we wait for that conclusive evidence to come in, it may be too late to do anything about the problems that may be caused by global warming. The guess here is that, despite all the aforementioned uncertainty, if we are pummeled by another four or five devastating hurricanes this year the global warming issue will become a more prominent talking point in the debate on energy policy.
And I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see more and more Gulf Coast residents trading in their gas-guzzling SUVs for hybrid cars and maybe even bicycles in an attempt to appease Mother Nature.
Bill Ferguson is a columnist for the Macon (Ga.) Telegraph.
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