Well, was anyone expecting much more from a NY Times columnist?
Will Climate Get Some Respect Now?
Yeah, I respect the hell out of what the natural processes of the Earth can do, and have been doing for billions of years. But, if Nicholas is so concerned, he should get the big shots at the NY Times to leave the A/C off in the building. It’s supposedly bad for hotcoldwetdry.
President Obama and Mitt Romney seemed determined not to discuss climate change in this campaign. So thanks to Hurricane Sandy for forcing the issue: Isn’t it time to talk not only about weather, but also about climate?
Sure. We’ll talk about how you’ve made your life carbon neutral….oh, you haven’t.
It’s true, of course, that no single storm or drought can be attributed to climate change. Atlantic hurricanes in the Northeast go way back, as the catastrophic “snow hurricane†of 1804 attests. But many scientists believe that rising carbon emissions could make extreme weather — like Sandy — more likely.
They can believe and fantasize all they want. What they can’t do is prove it scientifically. Nic offers up a few reasons why Sandy was anthropogenically caused
Hurricanes form when the ocean is warm, and that warmth is their fuel. The Atlantic waters off the East Coast set a record high temperature this summer. Presumably most of that is natural variation, and some is human-induced climate change.
So, it’s mostly due to nature? His first reason blows away his whole premise.
Computer models suggest that hurricanes won’t necessarily become more frequent, but they may become stronger. As the United States Global Change Research Program, a collaboration of federal agencies, puts it, “The intensity of these storms is likely to increase in this century.â€
Computer models. Snicker. They had been preaching that there would be more hurricanes making landfall. When that didn’t pan out (Isaac was the first since 2008, and the last Cat 3 was in 2005), they decided to shift the focus of their hysteria. And while Sandy was pretty damned big, it wasn’t that powerful. But, just to be clear, even a mid-level tropical storm is damned dangerous, especially when pushing a storm surge into an area that funnels water, with Long Island and NJ creating a capturing “L” shape. Still mostly or solely natural.
Climate change adds moisture to the atmosphere, which may mean that storms come with more rain and more flooding.
Most of the flooding was from storm surge, chump. Not rain. But, it’s a cute little talking point.
I was schooled in the far-reaching changes under way several years ago by Eskimos in Alaska, who told me of their amazement at seeing changes in their Arctic village — from melting permafrost to robins (for which their Inupiat language has no word), and even a (shivering) porcupine. If we can’t see that something extraordinary is going on in the world around us, we’re in trouble.
My goodness, the Earth changes? Who would have thought that could happen. You know, like during the previous warm periods, which were warmer than today.
There are no easy solutions, but we may need to invest in cleaner energy, impose a carbon tax or other curbs on greenhouse gases, and, above all, rethink how we can reduce the toll of a changing climate. For example, we may not want to rebuild in some coastal areas that have been hammered by Sandy.
That’s strange, he doesn’t talk at all about the changes he’s made in his own life. Warmists never talk about that, because they never do.
Read: Poor Nicholas Kristoff Channels The Goracle »
