Hurricanes are nature’s most destructive agents. They have recently been linked to changes in climate. A 4-day international summit on hurricanes and climate change took place in 2007 to discuss and debate various scientific issues related to this important topic. There were 77 attendees from 18 different countries who participated in the summit.
This book is a sample collection of papers from talks that were presented. The chapters are organized around the broad hurricane-climate themes of empirical evidence, statistical methods, and numerical models. A major focus of the conference was the importance of statistical models for understanding how hurricane activity is changing and may change in the future. Emphasis was also placed on evidence of low-frequency swings in hurricane activity using historical and geological records. Results from various high-resolution numerical models, including a 20-km mesh model, were consistent in showing stronger hurricanes in a warmer future. Most numerical models indicate an overall decrease in the number of storms attributable to greater atmospheric stability and to a decrease in vertical mass flux.
This book is unique in its scope drawing from an international community of scholars in the field of hurricane climate science. The science addresses a variety of perspectives ranging from the microphysics of lightning to geological evidence of prehistoric storminess.
Author(s): Kevin Walsh, David Karoly, Neville Nicholls (auth.), James B. Elsner, Thomas H. Jagger (eds.)
Edition: 1
Publisher: Springer US
Year: 2009
Language: English
Pages: 380
Tags: Meteorology/Climatology; Climate Change; Ecotoxicology; Oceanography; Biogeosciences
Front Matter....Pages i-xvii
Detection and Attribution of Climate Change Effects on Tropical Cyclones....Pages 1-20
Electrification in Hurricanes: Implications for Water Vapor in the Tropical Tropopause Layer....Pages 21-34
Long-Term Natural Variability of Tropical Cyclones in Australia....Pages 35-59
Statistical Link Between United States Tropical Cyclone Activity and the Solar Cycle....Pages 61-71
Five Year Prediction of the Number of Hurricanes that make United States Landfall....Pages 73-99
A New Index for Tropical Cyclone Development from Sea Surface Temperature and Evaporation Fields....Pages 101-120
Probability of Hurricane Intensification and United States Hurricane Landfall under Conditions of Elevated Atlantic Sea Surface Temperatures....Pages 121-138
Wavelet-Lag Regression Analysis of Atlantic Tropical Cyclones....Pages 139-152
Network Analysis of U.S. Hurricanes....Pages 153-167
Migration of the Tropical Cyclone Zone throughout the Holocene....Pages 169-187
Aerosol Effects on Lightning and Intensity of Landfalling Hurricanes....Pages 189-212
Response of Tropical Cyclogenesis to Global Warming in an IPCC AR4 Scenario....Pages 213-234
Risk of Tropical Cyclones over the Mediterranean Sea in a Climate Change Scenario....Pages 235-250
A Fast Non-Empirical Tropical Cyclone Identification Method....Pages 251-263
Boundary Layer Model for Moving Tropical Cyclones....Pages 265-286
Changes in Tropical Cyclone Activity due to Global Warming in a General Circulation Model....Pages 287-321
Relationship between ENSO and North Atlantic Tropical Cyclone Frequency Simulated in a Coupled General Circulation Model....Pages 323-338
Modeling of Tropical Cyclones and Intensity Forecasting....Pages 339-359
Roadmap to Assess the Economic Cost of Climate Change with an Application to Hurricanes in the United States....Pages 361-386
The Science and Politics Problem: Policymaking, Climate Change and Hurricanes....Pages 387-411
Back Matter....Pages 413-419
