floods

Many willl be surprised as it dawns that the biggest catastrophic event likely to happen today in California is a flood caused by a rainstorm. The US Geological Survey recently studied flood risk in California by modelling what would happen if the state was hit by an event about one half as severe as the greatest flood to have happened in the state since it was settled by Europeans, i.e. the Great Flood of 1861-62.[read more]

People hear climate change through different concerns. Some hear threats to the environment, others to people, and others still to national security. (Of course, there is overlap.) For those in the national security category, the National Security Journalism Initiative has created Global Warning. Water shortages in Yemen Go to A...[read more]

I have just been at the inaugural Global Green Growth Forum (3GF) in Copenhagen. This was a high level event, opened by the Crown Prince of Denmark and the new Danish Prime Minister, then following the initial panel discussion there was an introductory keynote by United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon – in person. At its root, the green growth agenda feels like a growing worry that the market structure we have created over the last two centuries isn’t sufficiently robust to take us forward and that somehow market fundamentals like supply, demand and ultimately price won’t work.[read more]

The Southeastern United States is experiencing an Unusual drought, part of the extreme weather condition pattern that is probably related to anthropogenic global warming.Government climate scientists are using terms such as exceptional and extreme drought to describe the current situation which extends from Arizona eastward into Texas...[read more]

The record-breaking flooding in North Dakota over the weekend and record-breaking drought that grips Texas and other southern-tier states are part of this trend. Many reports pin the current extremes on a strong La Niña pattern in the Pacific Ocean. Texas doesn’t always dry up during La Niña; yet, we know the risk of drought is higher during La Niña even if it doesn’t always pan out. In other words, we know that La Niña is a risk factor, just as a high-salt diet is a risk factor for heart disease.[read more]

By many accounts 2011 has been a year of weather extremes and some commentators have used certain events to highlight the risks associated with climate change. While there is increasing evidence of unusual global weather events, should we just assume that every disaster is a sign of things to come?[read more]

After a long, hot period of drought in eastern Australia, spanning much of the 1990s and 2000s and referred to as the worst in 1000 years (see also discussion on BNC on the drought here and the strange winter of 2009 here), the period 2010-2011 has seen record rainfall and rural flooding events in Australia. This has culminated this...[read more]

I was asked by the Adelaide Advertiser newspaper to write a short piece last week which addressed the question “Does all the recent rain across the country prove man made climate change is real?“, in less than 500 words. My response, given below, appeared in the print edition on Thursday 9 September 2010: ———————————— Does all the recent...[read more]

The ongoing debate about the growing connections between food and energy has focused mainly on the influence on food prices of high energy prices and the diversion of crops into biofuel production. We are about to get our first real taste of the other side this relationship. There is a serious prospect that the direct and indirect...[read more]