#MIT - Climate More BIG Storms Up North

Study: Dangerous storms peaking further north, south than in past

New analysis of cyclones shows migration away from tropics and toward the poles in recent decades.

Peter Dizikes

(MIT News Office) – Powerful, destructive tropical cyclones are now reaching their peak intensity farther from the equator and closer to the poles, according to a new study co-authored by an MIT scientist.


The results of the study, published today in the journal Nature, show that over the last 30 years, tropical cyclones — also known as hurricanes or typhoons — are moving poleward at a rate of about 33 miles per decade in the Northern Hemisphere and 38 miles per decade in the Southern Hemisphere.    “The absolute value of the latitudes at which these storms reach their maximum intensity seems to be increasing over time, in most places,” says Kerry Emanuel, an MIT professor and co-author of the new paper.


“The trend is statistically significant at a pretty high level.”

   And while the scientists who conducted the study are still investigating the atmospheric mechanisms behind this change, the trend seems consistent with a warming climate.

“It may mean the thermodynamically favorable conditions for these storms are migrating poleward,” adds Emanuel, the Cecil and Ida Green Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at MIT.    The implications are serious, since the movement of peak intensity means regions further north and south of the equator, which have not previously had to face many landfalls by violent cyclones, may now have greater exposure to these extreme weather events.

That, in turn, could lead to “potentially profound consequences to life and property,” the paper states. “Any related changes to positions where storms make landfall will have obvious effects on coastal residents and infrastructure.”

Moving with the trade winds?

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WOW! It is going to get worse?

 

 

Doc's Comments:

 

As things get worse the deniers persist to try to keep the lid on legitimate science. In the end, they will get what they deserve; while many innocents are caught up in the storms. Very sad. 

 

Dr. Peter G Kinesa

June 2, 2014

 

 



NOW End Game Stage of Fossil Energy

We Are Now in the Terminal Stage of Our Fossil-Fuel Addiction

 Senior politicians in both parties have become so intoxicated by the idea of an American surge in energy production that they have lost their senses.



By Michael T. Klare 

(The Nation) – Of all the preposterous, irresponsible headlines that have appeared on the front page of The New York Times in recent years, few have exceeded the inanity of this one from early March: “US Hopes Boom in Natural Gas Can Curb Putin.” The article by normally reliable reporters Coral Davenport and Steven Erlanger suggested that, by sending our surplus natural gas to Europe and Ukraine in the form of liquefied natural gas (LNG), the United States could help reduce the region’s heavy reliance on Russian gas and thereby stiffen its resistance to Vladimir Putin’s aggressive behavior. 

Forget that the United States currently lacks the capacity to export LNG to Europe, and will not be able to do so on a significant scale until the 2020s. Forget that Ukraine lacks any LNG receiving facilities and is unlikely to acquire any, as its only coastline is on the Black Sea, in areas dominated by Russian speakers with loyalties to Moscow. Forget as well that any future US exports will be funneled into the international marketplace, and so will favor sales to Asia where gas prices are 50 percent higher than in Europe. Just focus on the article’s central reportorial flaw: it fails to identify a single reason why future American LNG exports (which could wind up anywhere) would have any influence whatsoever on the Russian president’s behavior. 



The only way to understand the strangeness of this is to assume that the editors of the Times, like senior politicians in both parties, have become so intoxicated by the idea of an American surge in oil and gas production that they have lost their senses.

As domestic output of oil and gas has increased in recent years—largely through the use of fracking to exploit hitherto impenetrable shale deposits—many policymakers have concluded that the United States is better positioned to throw its weight around in the world. “Increasing US energy supplies,” said then-presidential security adviser Tom Donilon in April 2013, “affords us a stronger hand in pursuing and implementing our international security goals.” Leaders in Congress on both sides of the aisle have voiced similar views. 

The impression one gets from all this balderdash is that increased oil and gas output—like an extra dose of testosterone—will somehow bolster the will and confidence of American officials when confronting their foreign counterparts. One former White House official cited by Davenport and Erlanger caught the mood of the moment perfectly: “We’re engaging from a different position [with respect to Russia] because we’re a much larger energy producer.”

It should be obvious to 
anyone who has followed recent events in the Crimea and Ukraine that increased US oil and gas output have provided White House officials with no particular advantage in their efforts to counter Putin’s aggressive moves—and that the prospect of future US gas exports to Europe is unlikely to alter his strategic calculations. It seems, however, that senior US officials beguiled by the mesmerizing image of a future “Saudi America” have simply lost touch with reality.

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#ParadiseLost - Paul Chefurka

“The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven…”

John Milton, Paradise Lost

 Paradise Lost

 First Financial Insights 

 Paul Chefurka

FIRST FINANCIAL INSIGHTS: Paul Chefurka - "Paradise Lost"
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“Paradise Lost” Paul Chefurka Many of us who have been paying attention to the state of the world over the last half century hav... 

The captioned linked article has garmered a lot of traffic this week, so for your convenience it is reposted here along with our comments on the author.

In the last analysis, the second law of thermodynamics describes and explains  so much of our behaviour and what reality has become and where it is headed. Since the dawn of time, to the day when eternities meet eternities it governs an existential universe.

Dr Peter G Kinesa

November 9, 2013 

Paul Chefurka is definitely one of the most exciting, brilliant and insightful thinkers of our times. His deep research and analysis of our current predicament lead the reader of his article titled Paradise Lost to a well-reasoned and provocative conclusion. One that is sure to stir your beliefs and outlooks for months, and years to come.