Linked to climate change, trend is expected to continue

As of the first of December , 12 billion-dollar weather disasters  had occurred in the U.S. in 2011, breaking any single year’s record for costly floods, droughts, wildfires, windstorms, blizzards and tornadoes.  The number of disasters in 2011 could climb higher as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) continues to collect data from two storms it has not yet declared breaking the billion-dollar damage mark, the October Northeast snowstorm and Tropical Storm Lee. The 12 storms cost 646 people their lives.

At least some of the increases in the number and intensity of natural disasters is attributable to climate change, according to NOAA’s chief, Jan Luchenco. Speaking at the meeting  of the American Geophysical Union this fall, Lubchenco warned, “What we are seeing this year is not just an anomalous year, but a harbinger of things to come for at least a subset of those extreme events that we are tallying.”  

The reinsurer Munich Re estimates the aggregate damage caused by the 12 disasters totals $52 billion. And this company, one of the world’s leading reinsurers, asserts there is a connection between the increase in natural disasters and climate change: “The high number of weather-related natural catastrophes and record temperatures both globally and in different regions of the world provide further indications of advancing climate change.”

Well known climatologist Kenneth Trenberth explains that the increasing intensity of storms is linked to  warmer air holding a greater amount of water vapor. Compared to 30 years ago, there is about a 4 percent increase in atmospheric moisture, supplying storm systems with additional energy.