Do record high sea surface temperatures (SSTs) increase the frequency and intensity of hurricanes as predicted by the IPCC?
Despite record high SSTs in the Atlantic basin, fewer hurricanes and major hurricanes have formed thus far.
For a brief discussion of hurricanes in the US see…
Hurricane season in the US is kicking into high gear
Hurricane season in the US… In the United States, hurricane season primarily refers to the Atlantic and Eastern North Pacific regions, as these are the areas most likely to be impacted by tropical cyclones. Atlantic Hurricane Season (which includes the North Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Caribbean Sea):
And for more information about how global major hurricane frequency has changed see…
Examining the most newsworthy climate papers in the last decade (Part 6)...
This is part of a multiple-part, subscriber-only series in which I investigate the most newsworthy climate papers each year and discuss if the predictions made by these papers, which gained so much media attention, have been observed. The most newsworthy climate paper of 2020…
There has been much discussion in the MSM and social media about SST globally and in the Atlantic basin, with average temps running nearly 1C above the 1982-2011 mean throughout the entirety of the hurricane season.
As discussed in the post above, the IPCC claims that as SST increases, it provides more energy to tropical cyclones, potentially making them more intense. The IPCC has reported that there is a likely increase in the intensity of tropical cyclones (i.e., more storms will reach higher categories on the Saffir-Simpson scale) with increased SST associated with global warming.
As 2023 was an anomalously high year for SSTs, if the IPCC was correct, we should see a corresponding increase in hurricane activity. However, thus far, the 2023 season has been significantly quieter than previous years in terms of total named storms, hurricanes, and major hurricanes.
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