Temperature and Storms.

[Weatherlawyer]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7596643.stm

Warming boosts strongest storms
By Richard Black
Environment correspondent, BBC News website

The strongest tropical storms are becoming even stronger as the
world's oceans warm, scientists have confirmed.

Analysis of satellite data shows that in the last 25 years, strong
cyclones, hurricanes and typhoons have become more frequent in most of
the tropics.

Writing in the journal Nature, they say the number of weaker storms
has not noticeably altered.

The idea that climate change might be linked to tropical storms has
been highly controversial.

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So far, so good.
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A few years ago, it was claimed that hurricanes would become more
frequent as well as more common in a warming world.

The swirling winds pick up energy from a warm ocean.

But recent research has suggested they would occur less frequently,
though likely to pack a more powerful punch each time.

James Elsner from Florida State University in Tallahassee, US and
colleagues believed the link might become clearer if they analysed
data according to the strength of storms.

"We're seeing a signal, and it's telling us that the strongest effect
(of rising ocean temperatures) is on the strongest storms," he told
BBC News.

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Or more likely, what is causing more intense storms is also causing
warmer water. It doesn't follow that an increase or a decrease in one
is directly related to an increase or decrease in the other. Or if it
does, then why didn't they see it?

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"At average or median wind speeds, about 40m/s, we don't see a trend;
but when we get up to 50 or 60m/s we do see a trend."

A hurricane featuring winds of 40m/s (89mph) is a Category One storm
according to the often-used Saffir-Simpson scale.

At about 60m/s (134mph) it enters Category Four, the strength at which
Hurricane Gustav recently hit Cuba before weakening to Category One
over the US coast.

However, the bulk of the scientific work on possible links to climate
change has featured North Atlantic hurricanes, largely because of the
relatively good historical records contained in the US.

The new analysis, using satellite data acquired by US, European and
Japanese programmes, shows up different trends across the tropics.

The increase in strong storms shows up most markedly in the North
Atlantic and Indian oceans, and is absent in the South Pacific.

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OK.
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"We're looking at different ocean basins, and some are already pretty
warm," said Professor Elsner.

"So there, an increase in temperature isn't going to produce as strong
an increase as in basins where the the temperatures are only
marginally supportive of cyclones."

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As they are working on the wrong premise that the temperature factor
is a function of some as yet unknown equation they have to be wrong
since it is not temperature but heat potential difference and wind
shear.
However if the heat is an incidental, the cause is yet to be found.
Such a cause would explain why non tropical storms only require a
temperature difference of some 3 degrees, rather than 5 for tropical
stuff.
(And of course they go the wrong way.)
All cyclones must have the same cause. An absence of cross winds being
a factor, something that causes temperature rises, one more. And
vorticity, of course, doesn't just happen.
Sea depth is a factor in their sojourn I believe. The deeper the ocean
the slower they go. But then I can only just about forecast them, I
don't really know how they are caused.

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The researchers believe weaker storms are not affected so much because
the factors that prevent them developing to their full potential,
notably wind shear - abrupt changes in wind speed and direction that
prevent the cyclone fuelling itself with ocean heat - are not related
to ocean temperatures.

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How's that, again?
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Globally, a rise of 1C in sea surface temperature would increase the
occurrence of strong storms by about one third, the researchers
calculate.

Apart from human-induced climate change, the incidence of tropical
storms is determined by natural cycles such as El Nino that affect
surface temperatures in various parts of the oceans.

The damage they do is affected far less by their strength than by
where they hit land, and by how able a society is to withstand the
winds and rain.

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I would imagine the way the seas have been decimated, no, exhausted
and the sea beds destroyed along with the removal of mangroves and
clearing hinterland for hotels and retirement homes along with the
industrial support these new beach fronts engender.... is far more
likely to be the true causes of the ruin we are seeing.