Firstly, I hope you all had a great Christmas! It is this time of year that makes you really grateful for just the basic things in life. We are now fast approaching 2012 and is a good time to reflect on the past 12 months.
I don't think anyone can doubt that 2011 has had it's fair share of extreme weather events. December has seen the devastating monsoon in the Philippines that killed over 700, Scotland battered by a storm with wind speeds in excess of 165mph, whilst flooding in Kenya displaced thousands. November saw a mounting death toll in Cambodia after thousands were left stranded after monsoon conditions. In October residents fled Bangkok as flooding threatened to overwhelm the capital at the time when Texas was facing a dust cloud 8,000ft high, and the UK was facing it's highest October temperatures on record. There was also the freak snow storm along the US east coast which killed 11 and left millions without power, only two weeks after hurricane Irene had ripped through the Caribbean and the south-east. September had seen even more destruction for Texas in which huge wildfires destroyed hundreds of homes. Going back to May, the world witnessed one of the most extraordinary tornado sequences ever caught on camera with more than 165 in just 24 hours in the Missouri area. March saw the most devastating natural event of the year in which Japan was hit by a double tsunami leading to 20,000 deaths and millions of pounds of damage. Cyclone Yasi has long been forgotten, but struck the Australian coast only back in February, tearing roofs of houses and bringing power lines to the ground. Going right back to the beginning of the year, January saw 400 killed as a result of torrential rain and mudslides in Brazil, there was flooding in Sri Lanka which forced 300,000 from their homes, as well as flash floods in Queensland.
Climate change sceptics may suggest that we are just becoming more 'aware' of extreme events since the 'global warming' hype of the 1980s but from research over the past few months, and the experience of extreme weather events in my lifetime I can only come to the one conclusion that anthropogenic climate change is a primary driving factor in the increasing frequency of these extreme events.
An extract from the Scientific American, dating back to June, summarises this nicely through the results of one of the worlds largest insurance companies Munich Re. The company has compiled the world's most comprehensive database of natural disasters, reaching all the way back to the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in A.D. 79. The records are kept with extreme interest by financial companies, in order to successfully evaluate insurance risks. On average 700-1000 natural disasters are added to the database each year. Their data shows a small increase in geologic events such as earthquakes since the 1980s, largely down to better reporting. However, increases in the number of climate disasters is 'far larger'.
Peter Höppe, head of Munich Re's Geo Risks Research/Corporate Climate Centre:
"Our figures indicate a trend towards an increase in extreme weather events that can only be fully explained by climate change... It's as if the weather machine had changed up a gear."
In the latest SREX report, we have seen the IPCC state:
"There is evidence that some extremes have changed as a result of anthropogenic influences, including increases in atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases."
Direct cause and effect literature has been hard to come by in the past, but this year has seen a significant increase not only in literature suggesting increasing likeliness of climate change on extreme events, but also as direct attribution. This does not mean however that every extreme event is a direct result of anthropogenic climate change. For example, solar forcing causing winter lows which I looked at in a previous post, can be assigned to natural variability. There has always been extreme events, and always will be as a result of natural variability, but the latest findings point to both an intensification and frequency of such events as a result of human impact. Over time with better climate model simulations, greater understanding of the hydrological cycle (specifically with vorticity and wind speed), and an increase in data collaboration and research papers, will I'm sure, only pile on greater evidence that extreme weather is slowly becoming the new normal (unless human anthropogenic impact is significantly minimised or reduced).
All I can conclude with is a warning: Extreme Weather Ahead.
Signing off for 2011.
Hi Andy, What do you think about the stormy weather we have just had? the winds were pretty intense, half the roof blew off of someone's house down our road. Do you think that this will become the norm in the not so distant future?
ReplyDeleteHi Alice. Unfortunately I cannot give you a definitive answer on that one. As stated in my earlier post 'Wind turbine explodes... because of too much wind!' climate projections of wind speed currently do not yield consistent or robust estimates. This is largely due to lack of historical data. Often when it comes to wind, it is just 'peak' wind speeds and any broken records that are recorded and there is a real lack of longer term historical data with seasonality in wind speeds. Without this sort of data it can be very difficult to predict what might happen.
ReplyDeleteAs soon as new academic literature is published on wind speeds and climate change, I will most certainly blog about it!
Wow! I didn't realise there was so much extreme weather in 2011, this post is a great summary.
ReplyDelete(I know it's a bit late but I just read it and thought it was great!)