Just Add Warm Water

Apropos of recent discourse regarding the role of global warming and higher ocean temperatures in making recent hurricanes more destructive, a correspondent points to news of the recent publication of a paper in Nature (it’s a PDF file) that discusses this prospect. To cut to the chase, MIT scientist Kerry A. Emanuel says that though there’s little evidence that hurricanes are increasing in number due to the observed 0.5 degree C. rise in tropical ocean temperatures over the past few decades, a study of the power dissipated by tropical cyclones shows the storms are become more powerful and longer lasting and thus potentially far more destructive than before.

There’s math in the paper, which means it’s all a bunch of symbols and Greek letters to me. But Emanuel, who’s been doing advanced meteorological research since the ’70s, has put together something of a layperson’s resource explaining his work, “Anthropogenic Effects on Tropical Cyclone Activity” (anthropogenic means something you helped cause by driving down to the 7-Eleven instead of walking). The page includes a long essay I haven’t read yet, though I’m encouraged by the apparent lack of equations; but I did spot a genuine Great New Word there: paleotempestology. Emanuel’s credited (by one source) with coining it.

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