CEA Guest host Marc Morano explains.
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Marc Morano: Uh-oh! Hurricane season is here again. And with climate change, the storms are more frequent and stronger… except… they aren’t. The fact is, the media and climate change campaigners have been lying to you.
Yes… I know it’s hard to believe that the news media would be unduly hyping anything that draws more attention to themselves…but the evidence is clear that’s what they are doing.
Landfalls of major hurricanes in the U.S. have actually declined over the past 140 years, long before humans began burning large quantities of fossil fuels. And the downward trend in storms is holding steady over the past several decades.
As Roger Pielke, the professor of Environmental Studies at the University of Colorado testified before Congress, “The world is presently in an era of unusually low weather disasters.” Pielke Jr. points out that both hurricane landfalls and strength were “down by approximately 20 percent since 1900” and according to the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration, the worst decade for major hurricanes was the 1940s. In fact, as this chart shows: As carbon dioxide has increased in the atmosphere, landfalling hurricanes have declined in the United States.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change itself reported in 2013 that “No robust trends in annual numbers of tropical storms, hurricanes and major hurricane counts have been identified over the past 100 years in the North Atlantic Basin.” A 2016 analysis by Kenneth Richard found 33 peer-reviewed scientific papers revealing a lack of connection between global warming and hurricanes.
But what about the recent hurricanes… Michael, Irma, Maria, Harvey. Don’t they prove that hurricane activity is beginning to ramp up? In a word… No.
What the media has largely ignored is the fact that between 2005 and 2017 no major hurricanes made landfall in the United States. A major hurricane is defined as a Category 3 or larger. That 12-year span was the largest extended period of no hurricanes hitting the U.S. mainland since at least 1900, and possibly even the U.S. Civil War. The U.S. has had an amazing vacation from major hurricane activity during that time. When Harvey hit in 2017, it was simply a return to normal.
You might remember some climatologists and media outlets claiming that the enormous amount of rain associated with Hurricane Harvey was due to climate change. Penn State Professor Michael Mann wrote in an op-ed piece: “It’s a fact. Climate change made Hurricane Harvey more deadly.” But in truth, Harvey was more destructive and deadly because it got trapped between a high-pressure system in the west and another system to the east, which is extremely rare. As Climatologist Judith Curry said at the time, “Anyone blaming Hurricane Harvey on global warming doesn’t have a leg to stand on. The huge amounts of rain are associated with Harvey’s stalled movement.”
If hurricanes aren’t more frequent or powerful, what’s really going on here… besides the media hyping gloom and doom for their own purposes? Perhaps Roy Spencer, a research scientist whose work has been funded by NASA, NOAA and the Department of Energy said it best, “In order for politicians to advance policy goals…such as forcing expensive solar energy on the masses or creating a carbon tax…they have to turn normal weather disasters into ‘evidence’ of climate change.”
I couldn’t have said it better myself.
For the Clear Energy Alliance, I’m Marc Morano. Power On.
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Bjorn Lomborg: ‘Harvey & Irma are terrible, but…Major landfalling US hurricanes trending downwards over past 140 years’ https://www.climatedepot.com/2017/09/07/bjorn-lomborg-harvey-irma-are-terrible-but-major-landfalling-us-hurricanes-trending-downwards-over-past-140-years/
Chart: As CO2 has risen, major landfalling US hurricanes declining over past 140 years – ‘Maybe we need MORE CO2’ http://1ggye33lc4653z56mp34pl6t-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Screenshot-2017-09-07-at-12.52.45.png
Atlantic Hurricane season ends slightly above normal in count, but with major hurricane drought intact https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/11/30/atlantic-hurricane-season-ends-slightly-above-normal-in-count-but-with-major-hurricane-drought-intact/
4,300 Days Since Last U.S. Major Hurricane Strike http://www.drroyspencer.com/2017/07/4300-days-since-last-u-s-major-hurricane-strike/
