Worried About Climate

With Wilma the most powerful storm ever in the Atlantic, destruction of Cozumel and Cancun certain, and who knows what is to come in the US (one forecaster suggests snow and a powerful extratropical storm...) you have to worry a bit about climate change. And the latest issue of Scientific American has the rest of the story. Title: Climate Model Predicts Extreme Changes for the US.

"Climate change is going to be even more dramatic than we previously thought," says Noah Diffenbaugh, who reported his team's findings in the October 17 online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. ...Diffenbaugh's model predicts several events: the desert Southwest will have more frequent and intense heat waves, combined with less precipitation during the summer; the Gulf Coast will grow hotter and experience heavier rainfalls in short time periods; the Northeast will suffer under longer, hotter summers; overall, the continental U.S. will undergo a warming trend that will reduce the length of winter.

This isn't something that can be stopped. But it is something that we can be planning for - both as individuals and as a community. And we are not. That does have me worried.