by Stephen Taft, SUNY Cortland
Posted in on Thursday, Dec 8
The hurricanes that devastated the gulf coast raised a lot of question for America. One of these looks to the future, asking just how much worse will these hurricanes get; and more importantly, are humans making them worse and more frequent every year with global warming.
“Hurricanes gather heat and energy through contact with warm ocean waters. Evaporation from the seawater increases their power.” The hurricanes become most dangerous when they make landfall. The rain and winds can reach destructive speeds and waves can wipe out coastlines.
While global warming has become relatively accepted scientific fact, its links to the creation of hurricanes are under dispute.
“‘We think if the climate in the tropics warms, hurricanes will become more intense,’ said Massachusetts Institute of Technology meteorology professor Kerry A. Emanuel. He added, however, that researchers are not sure whether the warming could cause more hurricanes to develop.’
‘If the tropical ocean temperatures were warmed by about 4 degrees Fahrenheit, then you should start to notice that the hurricanes are more intense,’ said Emanuel, addressing hundreds of emergency management officials gathered for the National Hurricane Conference. ‘Scientists differ widely as to how long it would take tropical water temperatures to rise as much as 4 degrees if global warming continues,’ Emanuel said.
‘The estimates I've seen talk about at least 40 years, maybe 100 years, somewhere in that range.’”
Human global warming might not be the only problem. It is unproven yet but many scientists say were are in a period of global heating, which has little or nothing to do with emissions. They say that this is a natural phenomenon that happens over time. There are periods of cooling as well, which has been tested by looking at tree rings that can date changes of temperature over long periods of time.
So the problem people must face in the near future is how to change this global warming trend that will create more dangerous hurricanes. Steps have been taken to reduce emissions from cars and factories but will it be enough? In the future will there be hurricanes with double the power of Katrina? Hopefully science will give a solution or at least a course of action to keep these destructive forces of nature in check if possible.
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://neovox.cortland.edu/mt/mt-tb.cgi/337