Hurricane expert reconsiders global warming’s impact

As I previously reported in my post titled: Hurricane frequency and global warming NOT the cause of increased destruction, it appears that the “link” cited by Gore and others trying to equate global warming to hurricane frequency is rapidly evaporating. A new study published in BAMS has just gotten some press coverage.

We have this story from the Houston Chronicle:

One of the most influential scientists behind the theory that global warming has intensified recent hurricane activity says he will reconsider his stand. The hurricane expert, Kerry Emanuel of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, this week unveiled a novel technique for predicting hurricane activity.

The new work suggests that, even in a dramatically warming world, hurricane frequency and intensity may not substantially rise during the next two centuries.

The research, appearing in the March issue of Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, is all the more remarkable coming from Emanuel, a highly visible leader in his field and long an ardent proponent of a link between global warming and much stronger hurricanes. His changing views could influence other scientists.

“The results surprised me,” Emanuel said of his work, adding that global warming may still play a role in raising the intensity of hurricanes but what that role is remains far from certain.

[...] Among the first to publish was Emanuel, who, just three weeks before Hurricane Katrina’s landfall, published a paper in Nature that concluded a key measurement of the power dissipated by a storm during its lifetime had risen dramatically since the mid-1970s. In the future, he argued, incredibly active hurricane years such as 2005 would become the norm rather than flukes. This view, amplified by environmentalists and others concerned about global warming, helped establish in the public’s mind that “super” hurricanes were one of climate change’s most critical threats. A satellite image of a hurricane emanating from a smokestack featured prominently in promotions for Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth.

[...] In the new paper, Emanuel and his co-authors project activity nearly two centuries hence, finding an overall drop in the number of hurricanes around the world, while the intensity of storms in some regions does rise. [...] By publishing his new paper, and by the virtue of his high profile, Emanuel could be a catalyst for further agreement in the field of hurricanes and global warming, Curry said.

LINKS:

See the news article excerpted above at the Houston Chronicle here.

Steve McIntyre at Climate Audit has a review of the paper here.

See the paper from the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society here.

 

 

Californians’ power bills to bankroll climate institute

From this article in the Bay Area Insider

“The California Public Utilities Commission on Thursday unanimously approved the $600 million California Institute for Climate Solutions, which will be paid for by money from ratepayers’ monthly electric bills, to the tune of $60 million a year.”

This promises to add yet another level of bureaucracy to an already bloated state government. This was a complete surprise to me, no notices of comments or public input ont his was circulated that I am aware of, and I get a number of those notices as well as getting info sent to me from a variety of sources.

As a Californian, I feel blindsided by this. Perhaps some civil disobedience in the form of sending in my power bill payment each month, minus that fee, with a note that says: “I disagree with and dispute this charge” is warranted. 

h/t Russ Steele

Here is the official press release from the CPUC:

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE PRESS RELEASE
Contact: Terrie Prosper, 415.703.1366, news@cpuc.ca.gov Docket #: R.07-09-008

CPUC ESTABLISHES INSTITUTE FOR CLIMATE SOLUTIONS

TO BUILD ON STATE’S ENVIRONMENTAL LEADERSHIP

SAN FRANCISCO, April 10, 2008 - The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) today created the California Institute for Climate Solutions (CICS), taking a bold and innovative approach to expanding California’s leadership on this most pressing of environmental issues.

Hansen pressures textbook publisher

Recently we saw how an environmental activist managed to convince a BBC writer that the story he wrote had to be changed to reflect what the activist perceived to be the “correct” view.

Now we find that Dr. James Hansen, director of GISS, has done the same, and on NASA stationery no less. Read the entire letter here courtesy of the “Friends of the Earth” website.

Because Hansen wrote on NASA stationery, it becomes a public document, which we can view here. For that reason, I’ve posted a backup copy here, just in case the original disappears or changes. See hansen_letter.

Writing to Houghton Mifflin Company, Hansen asks for changes in the textbook to reflect what he considers to be the truth and consensus:

Apparently, there is no room for debate in the classroom on these issues. Apparently also there is no uncertainty. Hansen also makes a mention of “so called activist scientists”. I think he proved the point about activist scientists quite well with this letter.

What is most curious, is that in letters Hansen has written in the past, such as to the Prime Minister of Australia, he uses his home address in Kintersville on plain paper, and in his reply to a coal company executive on Columbia University stationery, but puts his NASA title on it. This makes me wonder how he chooses which stationery to write what letter on, and how to sign it.

Maybe it is just a byproduct of all that censorship by the Bush administration:

Source: Roger Pielke Jr. Prometheus