San Francisco -- Not since 1927 has the Mississippi River crested so high for so long. This year has seen more tornadoes than ever before in U.S. history; not since 1925 have so many people died from twisters. The fires last month in Texas were the worst in 90 years, the drought the worst in a century. Ironically, most of the states afflicted by recent weather extremes voted last November to shrink the federal government and drown it in a bathtub -- the extreme weather is hammering Tea Party country. The response was predictable. Texas Governor Rick Perry stopped talking about secession and started asking for federal help, governors in the tornado belt called for Obama to declare them eligible for more aid, and along the Mississippi, the big complaint was that the Corps of Engineers hadn't built enough dikes high enough. States' rights, anyone?
The states facing this fury of hyper-weather are also, for the most part, represented in Congress by die-hards who advocate continuing climate disruption by choking the atmosphere with greenhouse pollution. While some of these folks claim that the whole idea of global warming is a hoax, what they really believe is that while the climate is warming, we should let the future worry about it, because adjusting to new weather patterns is cheaper than giving up our addiction to coal, oil, and carbon waste.
The climate disasters of the past two years alone ought to put that argument to bed for good. Last year we had floods the size of England in Pakistan, drought and heat that burned more than 300,000 acres and destroyed the entire wheat crop in Russia. Observers called it "the Year of Extreme Weather." Now, in the spring of 2011, it's America's turn. The odds that we are having three different "once-in-a-century" weather disasters in the same region in the same month would be incredibly small -- unless, as climate scientists have been warning, these extremes are no longer "once-in-a-century."
The U.S. weather system has now been bulked up by climate pollution like an athlete on steroids, so that it can unleash what were previously very rare hyper-weather events on a regular basis. A warmer climate does not just raise the thermometer; it also stores more energy, which kicks up extreme winds and carries more water vapor to power bigger storms. Just as a pot of sauce gets violent when it boils, we are seeing the weather do the same.
We won't know the full bill for this year's hyper-weather for a while. It's only May, and the rising Mississippi floods themselves may well have far more painful surprises in store as the rains pelt down and the waters move south down the river towards New Orleans. No one knows what this summer will bring.
It's important to note that mismanaging our carbon budget is not the only folly we are paying for. The Mississippi River needs more floodplains, wetlands, and floodways. Its levees should be built further back, not higher. The river is suffering from congested arteries as well as heavy rains. There shouldn't be 300 people in harm's way in the New Madrid floodway; then the Corps could have opened it up earlier, sparing Cairo, Illinois. We need to be smarter about planning for hyper-weather while we also stop encouraging it.
The glib and absurd notion that we can somehow "adapt" easily to climate disruption refuses to die. Climate action cynics like Bjorn Lomborg and the Fox network continue to claim that since any one episode of hyper-weather may not be linked to carbon pollution, we can ignore the overall reality -- a warmer climate means more extreme weather. As you watch the flood waters rise along the Mississippi, remind yourself: extreme weather is not something you should try at home.
Follow Carl Pope on Twitter: www.twitter.com/CarlPope
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How about diesel at $20/barrel. Impossible you say? See Moving Beyond Oil on the same website.
Can that turn the oil companies into colossal fossils? And burst the gasoline price bubble once and for all?
Imagine if highly improbable breakthroughs like these were well supported for 24/7 validation, development and production. That takes only a few adventure capital angels, much more likely than getting our leaders to lead.
And the results are likely to be a flock of Black Swan breakthroughs. See Black Swans on the same website for a few of the possibilities.
Sierra Club employees and members aren't any richer than anyone else, and shouldn't be expected to act any differently. The big difference is that they actually realize that global problems can't be solved without action that is taken at scale. This means asking people to just voluntarily buy a hybrid or putting a solar panel on their house just because they're concerned about AGW, isn't going to cut it. The delusion that people just trying to lead by example in order to solve a problem of this magnitude, is just that.... a delusion. You can't solve global problems without global solutions.
Oh well, as Bernard Shaw once said,
Democracy is a device that insures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.
I'm still waiting for these people to explain how the climate scientists were able to ACCURATELY PREDICT these changes in the weather that we're now seeing, when the scientists made these predictions several years ago.
I sure didn't see any of the "nay-sayers" make these predictions!
Or as someone like Pat Robertson would have said if it had been liberals instead of Tea Partiers, "This is God's vengeance for their sins against God," or some other ridiculously callous and imprudent words.
Of course, he DIDN'T say that, but I can just imagine what would have been said if roles were reversed. And yes, it is rather ironic who's getting the brunt of this, given their screeching for "state's rights" and to go back to "limited government." Yeah, they want limited government except when they need help, or except when it comes to abortion, and then they want lots of government "intrusion."
Fascinating how they are able to rationalize such juxtapositions.
Makes you wonder how much carbon they were using in the 1920's doesn't it?
Perhaps the worst earthquake in Japan since 1923 has something to do with it as well?
Extreme weather events happen, Its just that we haven't had extreme events as bad as this year since 80+ years ago, but they do happen from time to time, they just used to happen less frequently and not all at the same time and with lower severity than they are right now.
This should be alarming that in one year, we had multiple weather events within a few months of each other that have each shattered the previous 80 year lull for their specific disaster type.
A more logical approach would be to track events of a certain type, and in a certain region over time. For example:
If the alarmists are correct, then you would expect the frequency and severity of hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico to increase. If you went through the labor of locating the data, you'll find that they haven't increased at all.
None of these events has any clear connection to global temperature changes. So the assertion that these events are caused by global warming is based on something other than science. Why does the author persist with claims such as this? It would seem to have something to do with making people think that the agenda is important. That that agenda is somehow more important than being honest with people.
You must be really smart to know something like that.
You're all over this nature science thing, dude.
Until we have better battery technology solar is going to have issues.. if we had better batteries cars would weigh less and go further on a charge.. perhaps they would rechage faster also?
I agree with Joe, for the $1.2 trillion we've put into Iraq and Afghanistan, we could've solved this by now.