Extreme events of 2011: climate change a major factor in some, but not all
The science of quantifying how climate change changes the odds of extreme weather events like droughts and floods took a major step forward Tuesday with the publication of NOAA's annual summary of the past year's weather. The 2011 State of the Climate report contains a separate peer-reviewed article published in the July issue of the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society titled, Explaining Extreme Events of 2011 From a Climate Perspective. In the paper, a group of scientists led by Peter Stott of the Met Office Centre in the United Kingdom looked at how climate change may have changed the odds of occurrence of some of 2011's notable weather extremes. These kinds of attribution studies require huge amounts of computer time and take many months to do, but the scientists plan to start making this a regular part of the annual NOAA State of the Climate report. Some of their findings for 2011:
- Determining the causes of extreme events remains difficult. While scientists cannot trace specific events to climate change with absolute certainty, new and continued research help scientists understand how the probability of extreme events change in response to global warming.
- La Niña-related heat waves, like that experienced in Texas in 2011, are now 20 times more likely to occur during La Niña years today than La Niña years fifty years ago.
- The UK experienced a very warm November 2011 and a very cold December 2010. In analyzing these two very different events, UK scientists uncovered interesting changes in the odds. Cold Decembers are now half as likely to occur now versus fifty years ago, whereas warm Novembers are now 62 times more likely.
- The devastating 2011 floods in Thailand caused an estimated $45 billion in damage, making it the world's most expensive river flooding disaster in history. The study found, however, that the amount of rain that fell in the catchment area was not very unusual, and that other factors such as human-caused changes to the flood plain and the movement of more people into flood-prone areas were more important in causing the disaster. "Climate change cannot be shown to have played any role in this event," the study concluded, but warned that climate models predict an increase in the probability of extreme precipitation events in the future in the region.
- The deadly drought in East Africa, which killed tens of thousands of people in 2011, was made more likely by warming waters in the Indian Ocean and Western Pacific. While the scientists did not specifically tie the warming of these waters to human-caused global warming, they noted that climate models predict continued warming of these waters in the coming decades, and this will likely "contribute to more frequent East African droughts during the spring and summer."
Figure 1. An SH-60F Sea Hawk helicopter assigned to Helicopter Anti-Submarine Squadron (HS) 14, flies around the Bangkok area with members of the humanitarian assessment survey team and the Royal Thai Armed Forces to assess the damage caused by the 2011 floods. Image credit: Petty Officer 1st Class Jennifer Villalovos.
Weather on steroids
One interesting aspect of the paper was the scientists' use of the baseball player-steroids analogy to help explain how climate change can increase the odds of extreme weather: "One analogy of the effects of climate change on extreme weather is with a baseball player (or to choose another sport, a cricketer) who starts taking steroids and afterwards hits on average 20% more home runs (or sixes) in a season than he did before (Meehl 2012). For any one of his home runs (sixes) during the years the player was taking steroids, you would not know for sure whether it was caused by steroids or not. But you might be able to attribute his increased number to the steroids. And given that steroids have resulted in a 20% increased chance that any particular swing of the player’s bat results in a home run (or a six), you would be able to make an attribution statement that, all other things being equal, steroid use had increased the probability of that particular occurrence by 20%. The job of the attribution assessment is to distinguish the effects of anthropogenic climate change or some other external factor (steroids in the sporting analogy) from natural variability (e.g., in the baseball analogy, the player’s natural ability to hit home runs or the configuration of a particular stadium)."
Video 1. National Center for Atmospheric Research scientist Dr. Jerry Meehl explains how climate change's impact on extreme weather is like how steroids affect a baseball player.
Jeff Masters
Reader Comments
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This is a WEATHER blog.
Weather is SCIENCE.
Science is based on FACT.
Evolution is a generally accepted FACT.
Therefore, let's try to STICK TO FACTS here.
If you want to deny evolution, go to a sci-fi or religion blog (same thing)...
Otherwise...
We've got the REALITY of a major hurricane to discuss!
While I believe in evolution it is still a theory, it is not a fact.
Where does it say "completely different"?
Given a few billion years, more or less, a few lucky mutations will change a life form into something rather different than the ancestor, but limited to the genome. Why else would we share so much of our own genome with other mammals, especially those so close to humans?
Really? You learn something every day.
I'm gonna try that.
I feel these discussions could be much shorter if dissenters like yourself would actually state reasons why you don't believe it. Perhaps we could help clear up any misconceptions.
Hint: god isn't a reason.
the topic of the blog post is climate change, innit?
...GIVEN THE CURRENT ANNULAR STRUCTURE ON SATELLITE...EMILIA WILL PROBABLY NOT CHANGE MUCH IN INTENSITY TODAY...BUT THE OVERALL TREND IS FOR THE HURRICANE TO GRADUALLY WEAKEN AS THE CIRCULATION STARTS TO INTERACT WITH COOLER WATERS IN ABOUT 12 HOURS OR SO.
THE TRACK HAS NOT CHANGED EITHER...AND EMILIA CONTINUES TO MOVE TOWARD THE WEST-NORTHWEST OR 285 DEGREES AT 8 KNOTS. THE HURRICANE IS TRAPPED SOUTH OF A STRONG SUBTROPICAL RIDGE WHICH IS FORECAST BY GLOBAL MODELS TO PERSIST. THIS STEERING PATTERN WILL LIKELY KEEP EMILIA MOVING ON THE SAME GENERAL TRACK UNTIL THE END OF THE FORECAST PERIOD WITH NO IMPORTANT CHANGE IN FORWARD SPEED. BECAUSE THE STEERING CURRENTS ARE WELL ESTABLISHED...THE TRACK GUIDANCE IS IN FAIRLY GOOD AGREEMENT...AND MOST OF THE MODELS HAVE A WEAKENING CYCLONE PROGRESSING WESTNORTHWESTARD AND WESTWARD. THE OFFICIAL FORECAST IS VERY CLOSE TO THE MODEL CONSENSUS AND NOT TOO FAR FROM THE PREVIOUS ONE.
A humans fear of death is not proof god exists.
Actually, pretty much everyone with an ounce of logic and took one year of a real life science in school accepts it as fact....
Please show me some verified evidence of creation which has gone through the scientific process and found to be true, then we can talk about the theory of a "God" creating things...
No problem dude.
I'd like to blame TWC for the evolution wrangling, but I don't think it would be fair as most of the parties have been here for long enough to know better. Enough! This is not the place.
Why it's heading out to sea too where it won't hurt any one so nothing too really too talk about other too check on it every now and then
+100000
If you are good at arguing you can argue for or against anything, for a class I had to argue cigarettes didn't cause lung cancer... that was hard.
It is closer to 99% I believe.
God (Creation) nor evolution can be proved. Each requires faith.
Keep, Grothar, much respect for both of you, but neither side will be changing the mind of the other tonight and the regular folks who want to turn things into a fight are swarming like sharks.
piece to both of y'all.
Why not? There is nothing else to talk about. At least this issue is fresh unlike AGW.
/r/atheism
You all should check that out sometime...
To each his own. Wasn't knocking what you believe.
I respect you more than most here, but all of this is just plain wrong. Morality doesn't come from god, it comes from common sense. I don't refrain from killing because a book or deific force tells me to. I don't kill because I don't want to kill. Contemplating that thought makes me feel bad, because I believe life is precious. I am accountable to myself. It has nothing to do with god or evolution.
And no, our country is "morally bankrupt" (I don't think it is) because people are stupid.
Just a stranger on the Bus
Just a slob like some of us
Trying to make his way home
Tribucanes, I am a Christian but I still believe in evolution. The story of God and Jesus is that, a story. Something that made the sense of the things around us. The ancient peoples didn't have the technology like us to explain nature.
Any one think Emilia will be stronger at the next update? Or will she be weaker?
Just in case you missed it:
When using Dr. Masters' blog, please refrain from posting material not relevant to the discussion of tropical weather, or the topic of the blog entry itself. Please do not engage in personal attacks or bickering. Material not conforming to these standards should be flagged with the button and ignored.
I wasn't knocking your religion. I was asking you to provide actual questions to the dilemma you seem to have with evolutionary theory.
I swear, some Christians and their persecution complex...
I took AP Environmental Science... that class taught me about global warming with TONS of facts to back it up. Global warming is clearly real, believe it or not.
"Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."
- John Adams
Stronger probably.
Still a bit sheared.
WHAT?! Thats a rule?!!
But with a better palate.
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