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posted by chromas on Thursday April 12 2018, @05:50PM   Printer-friendly
from the winters-too dept.

The Center for American Progress reports

This year has been "anything but ordinary" according to the latest data released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). In the first three months of 2018, the United States has seen three climate and weather disasters each resulting in more than $1 billion in damages.

Two of the four nor'easters to hit the central and eastern U.S. during a one month period resulted in record snowfall and more than a billion dollars in losses each. Millions were without power and hundreds of flights were grounded. Multiple deaths were reported across Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Virginia.

In mid-March, a deadly storm also hit the Gulf Coast with reports of dangerous winds, hail, and tornadoes. At least three people died and 20 tornadoes were reported in Alabama.

"It has been quite some time since the U.S. has experienced multiple, billion-dollar winter storm events", said Adam Smith, the NOAA scientist who compiled the data.

All told, the January to March period of the past three years has had the highest frequency of billion-dollar disasters on record since 1980--with 2018 surpassed only by 2016 and 2017.

As Smith told ThinkProgress via email, not only is the number of billion-dollar winter storms experienced in the past few years increasing, but the cost of these winter storms are increasingly above average compared to the 1990s, when a series of damaging storms--including a 1997-98 ice storm that hit the northeast--crippled parts of the country.

[...] Like with summertime hurricanes, winter nor'easters start in the ocean. And with warmer waters, these storms become more intense. According to Accuweather, this year's series of devastating nor'easters spent more time forming over the ocean, giving them a chance to increase in strength by absorbing more of the warmer ocean temperatures.

Additionally, with higher sea levels come more devastating storm surges. Massachusetts, for example, was repeatedly hit with coastal flooding during this year's winter storms.

Related: Climate change dials down Atlantic Ocean heating system


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  • (Score: 0, Troll) by khallow on Friday April 13 2018, @12:11AM (7 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday April 13 2018, @12:11AM (#666255) Journal

    Excellent reason to do nothing about it.

    Especially when the something that is being called for does nothing about it. It is better to do nothing about something than something about nothing.

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  • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 13 2018, @12:48AM (6 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 13 2018, @12:48AM (#666269)

    Just checkin'. Yes, khallow still has his head deep in the sand.

    • (Score: 0, Troll) by khallow on Friday April 13 2018, @07:57AM (5 children)

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday April 13 2018, @07:57AM (#666357) Journal
      And yet which modern attempts at climate change mitigation have worked? Even if we were to grant the most hysterical claims of climate change alarmism, we're still stuck with the problem that we haven't done much to change that. Most proposals are pretty harmful economically while doing little to solve the climate change problem.
      • (Score: 2) by NewNic on Friday April 13 2018, @05:21PM (4 children)

        by NewNic (6420) on Friday April 13 2018, @05:21PM (#666530) Journal

        Wow. Did you receive a check from the Koch Brothers or Robert Murray for that posting?

        Your argument is the classic: "we haven't done enough to address climate change, therefore, we should stop all efforts and do nothing".

        As for economic impact: in many cases, new solar capacity is actually cheaper than running existing coal plants. The cost of wind power has also dropped dramatically, so that it also competes with coal.

        Over time, the smart economic approach is to install renewables.

        --
        lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 13 2018, @10:09PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 13 2018, @10:09PM (#666644)

          I have it on good authority that khallow and jmorris trade their astro turfing for access to elite "services" like that backpage fiasco.

        • (Score: 1) by khallow on Friday April 13 2018, @11:58PM (2 children)

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday April 13 2018, @11:58PM (#666665) Journal

          Your argument is the classic: "we haven't done enough to address climate change, therefore, we should stop all efforts and do nothing".

          My argument is different. I think we've already done enough to address climate change at this time. Maybe in the future, decades or centuries from now, we'll need to do more. That remains to be see.

          The problem is that some people think we should do all sorts of things that do nothing, but at considerable cost such as passing treaties that create negligible reductions in CO2 emissions for considerable economic disruption or promoting on the public dime various ineffective renewable energy schemes. At that point, doing nothing for nothing is better than doing something for the same nothing.

          • (Score: 2) by NewNic on Monday April 16 2018, @12:32AM (1 child)

            by NewNic (6420) on Monday April 16 2018, @12:32AM (#667426) Journal

            The problem is that some people think we should do all sorts of things that do nothing, but at considerable cost such as passing treaties that create negligible reductions in CO2 emissions for considerable economic disruption or promoting on the public dime various ineffective renewable energy schemes

            So, basically, you don't really know the details of what is going on, but your are against it anyway. Typical.

            --
            lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
            • (Score: 1) by khallow on Monday April 16 2018, @12:41AM

              by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Monday April 16 2018, @12:41AM (#667428) Journal

              So, basically, you don't really know the details of what is going on

              The problem is that I do know what's going on. I know what the Kyoto Treaty was intended to do, and it's not much. I know that we've spent tens of billions on renewable energy projects that never will have any traction because they're either too niche (such as biogas generators) or too cumbersome/costly (such as solar thermal) compared to what we produce now in quantity.

              It's tiresome to have these same arguments over and over again where people ignore that we have remarkably little evidence in support of harmful climate change combined with a history of climate change mitigation that is similarly remarkably ineffective.