Warming Will Reduce Hurricanes: Study

Global warming will deliver decades of hurricanes, floods and heat waves

(NEWSER) - The US will suffer a wide range of increasingly extreme weather events in the coming decades as a result of global warming—from drought and excessive heat to wildly destructive hurricanes and record floods triggered by intense rains, reports the Washington Post. The grim prognosis was revealed in the latest report by the US Climate Change Science Program, which called extreme weather "among the most serious challenges in coping with a changing climate." More»

Forecast calls for normal year, less severe than recent years

(NEWSER) - Hurricane forecasters say this looks to be a pretty standard year for the Atlantic, with one to three major hurricanes expected in the six-month season that begins June 1. Some specifics from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration :

• Expect nine to 15 named storms, meaning winds reach at least 39mph

Carbon dioxide emissions take biggest jump on record

(NEWSER) - Carbon dioxide, methane, and other greenhouse gases continued to build in the atmosphere last year, a federal report finds: Between 2009 and 2010, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s yearly index of greenhouse gases—which measures said gases' combined heating effect—jumped 1.5%, to 1.29. It has climbed 29% since 1990, the Los Angeles Times reports. That number isn't the equivalent to a change in our temperature in degrees, but as it rises, so too does our warming potential, says a NOAA director. More»

Texas also set its own record for hottest July

(AP) - Sweltering may have reached a new record last month, as Oklahoma racked up the country's highest monthly average temperature ever. That's the highest average temperature, for any month, for any state, associate Oklahoma state climatologist Gary McManus said. According to automated weather recording instruments, the state's average for July was 89.1 degrees. That tops an average of 88.1 set in July 1954, McManus said. More»

Miami, New Orleans among most endangered

(NEWSER) - By the end of the century, 180 coastal US cities could be partially submerged thanks to rising seas, finds a new study that looked at cities in the Lower 48 with populations of at least 50,000. The climbing sea poses a risk to, on average, 9% of the land in these cities. Those most in jeopardy? Cities that hug the Atlantic coast and Gulf of Mexico: Miami, Tampa, New Orleans, and Virginia Beach. New York City, Washington, DC, and the San Francisco Bay area could face more minor damage, Reuters reports. More»