The record-setting Atlantic hurricane season of 2005, which included Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, sparked a lot of debate over whether global warming was in part responsible for all of the records, including the way the hurricane season lasted five weeks longer than normal, finally ending Jan. 6, 2006.
It was a year of firsts: The first year with 28 named storms; the first with 15 hurricanes; the first with four Category 5 hurricanes; and the first with four major hurricanes hitting the United States.
Chris Mooney explores the history and science of hurricanes and global warming in his 2007 book ‘Storm World: Hurricanes, Politics, and the Battle Over Global Warming’. I found this to be an excellent read. Mooney tells the story well, presents the science in an understandable way and assesses the science fairly. He also brings to life the personalities on all sides of the debate.
The book recounts the history of hurricane science, starting in the 19th century and lingering a bit in the 1950s and ‘60s, when scientists Herbert Riehl and Jule Gregory Charney developed divergent theories, based on empirical data and computer models, respectively. Two of the scientists currently involved in hurricane research and the global warming debate studied under them: William Gray under Riehl and Kerry Emanuel under Charney.
Mooney then guides us through the hurricane seasons of 2004 through 2006 and highlights the storm events, the major hurricane-related scientific papers published, and how the empiricists and climate modelers dueled during those years.
One key example was a paper by Emanuel published in the journal Nature on July 31, 2005 – a month before Katrina – in which he described how the power dissipated by Atlantic hurricanes had doubled over the last 30 years – and that it correlated closely with rising sea temperatures. This really grabbed the media’s attention after Katrina hit and a public debate over hurricanes and global warming took off. Gray and his colleagues took issue with Emanuel’s findings, Gray calling the paper “terrible” and even saying that Emanuel published such results to advance his career and get more research funding.
Mooney paints an unbiased picture of Gray, the 77-year-old dean of hurricane forecasting and data-driven research, who has issued hurricane forecasts for over 25 years and worked as a hurricane scientist for 50. Gray is an outspoken, joking, theatrical person who does not believe in global warming, and likes to call climate modelers “equation pushers.” His personality sways Mooney to like him. Gray was a pioneer in hurricane science and has long experience, but he seems set in his ways and won’t acknowledge the benefits of climate modeling. In the end, Mooney feels the scientific evidence has passed Gray by when it comes to global warming.
Along the way we learn how some scientists trained by Gray eventually left his camp and defected to the other. We see how the Bush administration muzzled scientists at NOAA and NASA and how those scientists fought back. Mooney also describes how recent studies have shown some links between global warming and changes in hurricane activity – including greater storm intensity and an increase in the number of storms we’re experiencing and the number of very powerful storms. He explains there are uncertainties about the magnitude of the effects, but that meteorologists agree that it is likely global warming will alter some aspects of hurricanes.
If you have followed the hurricane seasons with interest each year and were flabbergasted by how many times Florida got hit in 2004 and how active the 2005 season was — and you want to understand the hurricane science — then you’ll enjoy this book. It’s a well-written, engaging look at recent hurricane activity, the scientists who’ve studied it, and the results and conclusions they reached by the end of 2006. It’s a good look at how science evolves and how scientists themselves can change their thinking.
As Mooney says, somewhat dramatically, “Scientists, like hurricanes, do extraordinary things at high wind speeds.”
I would like to see how well each faction predicts hurricanes. The group that favors a link between global warming and hurricanes predicts X # of hurricanes vs the group that thinks the link between global warming and hurricanes is a bunch of hot air and see who is right. As for me I am for the group that predicts hurricanes for a living and not some climate activatist. Like Jack Webb said, “Just the facts”.
The past two seasons, however, were pretty much stagnant for hurricanes. How does hurricanes prove GW?
Thanks for the comments. In 2007, there were 15 named storms, 6 hurricanes and 2 major hurricanes (Category 3-5 storms); the long-term averages are 11 named storms, 6 hurricanes and 2 major hurricanes. So last year was pretty average.
2006 was less active, with 10 named storms, 5 hurricanes and 2 major hurricanes.
In NOAA’s Accumulated Cyclone Energy index, which accounts for the combined strength and duration of tropical cyclones, 2006 was 90 percent of the 1950-2000 mean value and 2007 was 84 percent of that mean. However, the previous three years were 247 percent of that mean value, and 2005 by itself was a record 284 percent.
(All data taken from NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center archive, http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/outlooks/hurricane-archive.shtml)
Note that hurricanes don’t prove global warming, but scientists expect global warming to affect hurricanes. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, for example, said in its February 2007 report that it is likely that global warming will make hurricanes more intense, with higher peak wind speeds and more heavy rains.