[Sys1]

As we are not sure that this tornadoes event can be linked to climate change, I propose to throw at faster rate CO2 in the atmosphere by burning all coal, forests and oil in order to reach a balanced conclusion.

[dohboi]

CP has a new post on the topic:

http://climateprogress.org/2011/05/02/tornadoes-extreme-weather-and-climate-change/#more-48014

[rockdoc123]

And Dr Roy Spencer has this to say:

If there is one weather phenomenon global warming theory does NOT predict more of, it would be severe thunderstorms and tornadoes.
Tornadic thunderstorms do not require tropical-type warmth. In fact, tornadoes are almost unheard of in the tropics, despite frequent thunderstorm activity.
Instead, tornadoes require strong wind shear (wind speed and direction changing rapidly with height in the lower atmosphere), the kind which develops when cold and warm air masses “collide”. Of course, other elements must be present, such as an unstable airmass and sufficient low-level humidity, but wind shear is the key. Strong warm advection (warm air riding up and over the cooler air mass, which is also what causes the strong wind shear) in advance of a low pressure area riding along the boundary between the two air masses is where these storms form.
But contrasting air mass temperatures is the key. Active tornado seasons in the U.S. are almost always due to unusually COOL air persisting over the Midwest and Ohio Valley longer than it normally does as we transition into spring.

http://www.drroyspencer.com/2011/04/more-tornadoes-from-global-warming-thats-a-joke-right/

Empirically it makes little sense to link tornado activity with warming. Severe tornadoes declined as the world warmed from 1975-2000, just as theory predicts they should. Severe tornadoes increased from 1950-1975, as the world cooled. There was even a Newsweek article in 1975 predicting increased tornado activity as the world continued to cool.

Pielke Sr published on tornado activity and its link to La Nina back in 2001 and again in 2005.
full 2005 article at:
http://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/nr-141.pdf

La Ni~na event years were found to have longer than average track lengths, more violent tornadoes, and a good probability of having an outbreak of 40 or more tornadoes. El Ni~no event years were found to have shorter than average track lengths, less violent tornadoes, and only a slim possibility of having an outbreak. Possible reasons for the above conclusions include: 1) Warmer than normal temperatures
in the western U.S./Canada along with cooler than normal temperatures in the southern U.S. during El Ni~no years; and 2) Colder than normal temperatures in the western U.S./Canada along with warmer than normal temperatures in the southern U.S. during La Ni~na years. This would act to weaken/strengthen the interactions between warm and cold air in the midwest U.S. during El Ni~no/La Ni~na event years and decrease/increase the numbers and lengths of violent tornadoes.

[dohboi]

Yep, those points were discussed in the article I linked to.

The main point is that we are conducting a vast, uncontrolled experiment with the earth's climate system, and it is impossible to know exactly how things will shake out in particular regions. The relatively gradual warming we have experienced so far is likely to accelerate considerably in the coming years. We are going to see new extremes of all sorts, but extreme droughts and floods are the weather events that show the clearest connection to gw.

But with a four percent increase in atmospheric water vapor, storms of all sorts are going to be more intense and severe. It is rather odd how little press the extreme flooding in Tennessee got, and annoying that GW is rarely mentioned in reports on the these events, even extreme floods and droughts are the events with the clearest GW fingerprint.

Meanwhile, here is the coverage of the issue at climate central:

http://www.climatecentral.org/blogs/tornado-outbreak-raises-climate-change-questions/

Since more moisture gets added to the atmosphere as the climate warms, additional water vapor may help severe thunderstorms and tornadoes to form. On the other hand, wind shear is expected to decline due to climate change, which would argue against an increase in tornado numbers.

According to some studies, though, by the end of the present century, the added water vapor will be enough to overcome the lower wind shear, and create more opportunities for severe thunderstorms to form.

Tornadoes are a bigger wild card for climate scientists than other types of extreme weather and climate events, such as heat waves and flooding.

So on the one hand, the topic needs more study before anything definitive can be said one way or the other (though, of course, all sorts of funding is being cut, so we will likely never know). On the other hand, since various conditions that up until recently had been predicted to not occur till near the end of the century are happening now, perhaps we will, in fact, be seeing more gw spawned tornadoes.

And elsewhere in the world:

[url]/news/worldnews/australiaandthepacific/newzealand/8489144/Tornado-hits-New-Zealands-biggest-city.html[/url]

Tornado hits New Zealand's biggest city
At least two people have been killed and many others injured when a tornado ripped through Auckland, New Zealand's largest city. ...

Tornados are not uncommon in Auckland but they are usually so small as to cause little or no damage.

[rockdoc123]

annoying that GW is rarely mentioned in reports on the these events, even extreme floods and droughts are the events with the clearest GW fingerprint.

hardly. Some of the largest flood events and droughts occurred at periods in the past completely unrelated to the upswing in anthropogenic CO2. As an example the recent flooding events in Australia are not as significant as a host of flooding events early in the twentieth centure and in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Droughts in the US are well known to be cyclical with one of the most severe droughts occurring in the thirties well before the large accumulation of anthropogenic sourced CO2. The sedimentary record shows equally bad cyclical droughts over the past 10000 years again unrelated to anthropogenic CO2.
Sorry but the attribution in support of your statement is not there, this is natural variation at work.

[dohboi]

Nicely put--forest for trees. Perhaps he should change is handle to "treedoc" but that would make him sound to much like a 'greenie' heaven forbid.

[rockdoc123]

Pstarr and dohboi.....if you can't argue the facts then why bother posting inane comments and ad hominem?
Are you suggesting what I've said is incorrect? If so please feel free to dazzle us all with your knowledge.
Attribution means the ability to find a AGW signal in some particular weather or climatic event. If that signal were present in tornados and drought and floods you would have statistical evidence that shows a correlation with anthropogenic CO2. Although correlation doesn't indicate causation, non-correlation definetely demonstrates non-causation. The fact that more frequent and intense Tornados have occurred well before the significant anthropogenic CO2 in the mid-twentieth century, more frequent and intense droughts and floods also were prevalent prior to this period indicates that the driving force is almost certainly natural variation. The number of papers that have been written over the past 10 years linking such events to natural variation ENSO patterns world wide is pretty significant and even the NOAA notes that there is no evidence linking ENSO to global warming.
Just because you want every dissaster to have an AGW explaination doesn't mean it does and ignoring data and observations that throw a monkey wrench into your pet theories is hardly consistent with the scientific method.

[rockdoc123]

You're various assertions including (but not limited to) ludicrous theories that . . .

--human activity is not responsible for oil reserve declines and associated extraction problem and,

--that epoch-level fossil fuel combustion does not contribute to historical atmospheric Co2 increases is beyond inane . . .

. . . it is f#cking ridiculous.

You seem to be confusing me with someone else, possibly someone in your apparently vivid imagination.

I have never said that human activity is not responsible for oil reserve declines and associated extraction problems. On the contrary I have posted on numerous threads since about 2005 some of which I pointed to ongoing depletion and my own prediction for peak assuming economic extraction of Canadian and Venezuelan heavy crudes (when I wrote those threads they were only marginally economic). I have posted numerous times on why abiotic oil theories fly in the face of good scientific evidence. I also posted extensively on the mega projects in Saudi Arabia and how they would impact available hydrocarbons. I challenge you to find a post where I suggest humans aren't responsbile for oil reserve declines.

I have never said anywhere that fuel combustion does not contribute to historical atmospheric CO2 increases. I have never argued that CO2 is at a high relative to the past hundred years or so. What I have argued is that there is no solid empirical evidence that this increased CO2 is the overall controlling factor with regards to temperatures or climate in general. Indeed there is evidence to suggest the link is weak between the two given that over the past two decades CO2 and temperature have gradually diverged, CO2 continuing it's rise and temperatures tending to flatten out. And there is a tremendous amount of literature backing up my claim that there is no empirical link between droughts, floods, hurricanes or tornados with AGW. I am more than willing to post those references. Again I challenge you to find a post where I suggest that fuel combustion has not contributed to atmospheric CO2 increase.

In short, get your facts straight before ranting on.

I suggest it is your contention and argument style that is

f#cking ridiculous

[dohboi]

I no longer interact much with rd. Anyone who continuously claims to know more than all of the established scientific bodies in the world is clearly not dealing from a full deck. Though it will soon almost certainly be true that CO2 will not be the major immediate force in global warming, since the methane bubbling out of the north will likely soon overshadow it. So perhaps he is actually prescient in a way?

[rockdoc123]

all of the established scientific bodies in the world

and anyone who takes political statements from organizations which do not speak for their entire membership (I'm a member of AGU, AAPG, GSA and a few others who have made generalized statements and interestingly enough I was never asked my opinion, obviously a vote by a "select" group) needs to worry that he is not getting the full story.
This isn't like your university education where you could get by with Coles notes.

[dohboi]

Usually you have to show up to the meeting to take a vote, rd.

Another form of goal post moving--no matter how many scientific bodies come to the same conclusion, now we have to go find the people who weren't asked or didn't show up to the meeting or the whole thing is merely 'political.'

The fact that 49 of the top 50 climatologists in the world are also in agreement that AGW is real and dangerous presumably won't fly because the one outlier must just happen to be the one who is right (even though he also receives money from ExxonMobile and his reputation is fading fast as his arguments get more and more patently ridiculous.)

Presumably, if some people around here wanted an answer to whether smoking was hazardous to their health, they would ask every expert in oncology in the world, who would all tell them it was indeed hazardous. But then finally they would find some guy who was in the pay of tobacco companies who said it was just fine, and they would conclude that this is the guy who must be right and all the others must be wrong.

The most generous thing I can say is that critical thinking skills seem to be rather...lacking in that judgment. Perhaps it's wishful thinking in overdrive? Let's not even consider straight out dishonesty.

[rockdoc123]

The fact that 49 of the top 50 climatologists in the world are also in agreement that AGW is real and dangerous presumably won't fly because the one outlier must just happen to be the one who is right

Give me a break, notwithstanding the fact that scientific truth has nothing to do with consensus opinion, each and everyone of those "top 49" individuals (BTW who gets to select them? What criteria?) actually counts on AGW being "real and dangerous" for their continued funding. And that funding is not small. Mann alone accounts for about $6 MM over the past decade (he even recieved a half million from Obama as part of the economic stimulus funds) and Phil Jones at CRU recieved $26 MM over a period of 20 years, $19 MM of which he recieved between 2000 and 2006. Obama increased funding to climate science by nearly $400 MM this year to what was already a >$2 billion dollar annual investment. If you were on the recieving end of such large sums would you put them at stake by saying AGW was a possibility and likely not to be very dangerous? No you would be writing up your NSF grant applications in order to get funding.

As to votes being taken at meetings. That didn't happen at AGU, nor at AAPG. In fact the AGU did not send out a poll to members. At one point AAPG polled its members but those results were not used in their statement.

As to a comparison with smoking, thats ridiculous. The experimental science which indicated the dangers of smoking resulted in hard evidence that was directly measureable. There was no modeling or assumptions about feedbacks or any other such thing. There were no bits of evidence sitting around that could argue the theory to be incorrect. You are comparing apples to oranges.

The most generous thing I can say is that critical thinking skills seem to be rather...lacking in that judgment

Pot calling the kettle black it seems.

[dohboi]

Your arguments have become so absurd, it is not really worth bantering with you any more (if it ever was).

[rockdoc123]

The NOAA has updated their pages with regards to the April Tornados
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/csi/events/2011/tornadoes/climatechange.html

Neither the time series of thermodynamic nor dynamic variables suggests the presence of a discernable trend during April; any small trend that may exist would be statistically insignificant relative to the intensity of yearly fluctuations. A change in the mean climate properties that are believed to be particularly relevant to severe storms has thus not been detected for April, at least during the last 30 years. Barring a detection of change, a claim of attribution (to human impacts) is thus problematic,

and possibly one of the more insightful comments made is:

Despite various limitations in data and tools, it should be noted that applying a scientific process is essential if one is to overcome the lack of rigor inherent in attribution claims that are all too often based on mere coincidental associations

[Pops]

Pretty bad, the hospital is in bad shape, fatalities reported...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lc9VoxDTpoY

[Pops]

Possible gas leak at the hospital, it's been evac'd.

Water conservation asked in the city to keep pressure up for fighting fires.