Last month a small but powerful cyclone named Chido made landfall in Mayotte before sweeping into Mozambique, causing considerable damage and leading to the loss of around 100 lives. Days after the tragedy, the Green Blob-funded Carbon Brief noted that scientists have “long suggested” that climate change is making cyclones worse in the region, while Blob-funded World Weather Attribution (WWA) at Imperial College London made a near-instant and curiously precise estimate that a Chido-like cyclone was about 40% more likely to happen in 2024 than during the pre-industrial age. Not to be outdone, Green Blob-funded cheerleader the Guardian chipped in with the obligatory “cyclones are getting worse because of the climate emergency”. Almost unnoticed, it seems, among all the Net Zero dooming and grooming was a science paper published during December by Nature that found no increase in the destructive power of cyclones – the generic term for typhoons and hurricanes – in any ocean basin over the last 30 years. In the South Indian basin, the location of cyclone Chido, there was a dramatic decrease in both frequency and duration in recent times.
Reality rarely gets much of a look-in these days when fanatical Net Zero activism is afoot, but the paper, written by a group of Chinese meteorologists, makes its case by considering the facts and the data. The scientists apply a “power dissipation index” (PDI) which they consider superior to single measure indicators since it combines storm intensity, duration and frequency. The graphs below show the cumulative index for tropical cyclones across all ocean basins along with a global indication.
Downward trends in the cumulative PDI can be seen in a number of Pacific regions, while the trend holds steady in the North Atlantic. The southern Indian ocean downward trend is particularly pronounced while the overall global line is also heading in a similar direction.
So why does all this scientific twaddle get written by the green activists in mainstream media? Much of it arises from the new pseudoscience that claims it can tie individual weather events to human-caused climate change. Press releases peddling climate Armageddon are issued days after a natural disaster and are eagerly reprinted by activist journalists promoting the Net Zero fantasy. The distinguished science writer Roger Pielke Jr. is a fierce critic of this new pseudoscience, which he calls weather attribution alchemy. In a recent Substack post in the aftermath of Chido, he noted that the WWA at Imperial College simply assumes the conclusion that it seeks to prove by accepting that every storm is made stronger because of warmer oceans. Using this explanation, continues Pielke, it is straightforward to conclude that the storm was made more likely due to climate change. Or as Imperial states: “The difference in the storm intensity and likelihood of this storm intensity between the counterfactual climate and today’s climate can be attributed to climate change.”
As the new Chinese paper shows, the matter is not quite so simple. Pielke notes that tropical storms encounter numerous environmental influences such as vertical wind shear and storm-induced ocean surface cooling, even when they remain over warmer waters. “Such complexities mean that simple storyline attribution – warmer oceans predictably mean stronger storms – is inappropriate when used to characterise the behaviour of individual storms,” he argues. Pielke also comes down hard on the statistical evidence backing the WWA claims. Even if storms such as Chido were more likely in the future, it would take a very long time to detect a significant change using the threshold 90% confidence set down by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). And by very long time, he means thousands of years.
“Perhaps that is why assumptions are favoured over evidence,” suggests Pielke.
There were plenty of assumptions on display in a now routine end-of-year weather report from the BBC headed: ‘A year of extreme weather that challenged billions.‘ Written by Esme Stallard, it claims that record-breaking heat brought extreme weather including hurricanes and month-long droughts. Pride of place is given to Dr. Friederike Otto, lead of WWA and Senior Lecturer in Climate Science at Imperial, who claimed: “We are living in a dangerous new era – extreme weather caused unrelenting suffering.” “The impacts of fossil fuel warming has never been clear or more devastating than in 2024,” she added.
The redoubtable Paul Homewood is unimpressed with Stallard’s opening line about increasing extreme weather and has filed a complaint with the BBC. Stallard goes on to list a handful of random events, “but fails to provide any evidence that these are anything other than natural events which happen all the time”, states Homewood. “Nor is any evidence provided that such events have been getting more frequent or extreme over time,” he adds.
The BBC story highlighted typhoons in the Philippines as well as hurricane Beryl and stated that such events may be increasing in intensity due to climate change. Official data do not show any evidence of them becoming more powerful over time, notes Homewood. Much play was made of a recent drought in the Amazon, but Homewood points out that the World Bank Climate Portal reveals that rainfall has increased in the area by 5% over the last 30 years. Throughout the report, observes Homewood, the BBC bases its claims on weather attribution computer models. “However, computer models are not evidence, and can be manipulated to provide whatever results are desired. That is why they are widely derided by the wider scientific community,” he states.
For Roger Pielke, extreme weather attributions are “puzzling”. The most charitable explanation for their proliferation is that there is a demand for them, including from many in the media. The demand will be filled by someone, he concludes. “A less charitable explanation is that there is a systematic effort underway to contest and undermine actual climate science, including the assessments of the IPCC, in order to present a picture of reality that is simply false in support of climate advocacy. We might call that pseudo-scientific gaslighting,” he suggests.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
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We have to blame the control knob, CO2, don’t we?
And here I thought that Flywheel Ed Milibrain was the control knob.
Certainly a knob; not sure about the control part though, out of control is more appropriate with regard to him.
Minibrain, being a control nitwit, is more like it.
Totslly lacking in ideas
No managerial skills
How in hell did the ass kisser get the job?
A jester of the King
The jester is a fool
He is the son of his father…. He happily stabbed his brother in the back.
His brother is doing OK from Ed’s role.
Never use the word knob in a comment on a UK website. You will get censored, I used the phrase control knob in several comment and they all “disappeared” until I figured out why.
Also, ALL CAPS and all bold font makes the Brits go berserk. Their PM and Energy Secretary are awful, but don’t write that with bold font or they will turn on you.
British a vulgar slang word for penis. Also an insult in “don’t be a knob”.
No, it is becoming clear that that is not the case. The so called science just doesn’t confirm anything like that.
I don’t give any study much credence, unless it’s been independently replicated. Truly independent, not Hockey Team independent.
It is simplest to note that not one serious climate forecast- outcome has EVER come to pass. When we have everyone of them occurring over twenty years may be…
AGREED. PEER REVIEW IS BROKEN ACTUALLY NEVER REALLY WORKED SINCE PEER REVIEW GENERALLY DOES NOT RESULT IN ANY ACTION.
You didn’t use “KNOB” in your post and forgot the bold.
This is clearly a case of where the BBC story does not match up with accurate data, the BBC has a sound policy developed and devoted to climate reporting. They lie.
“Bombshell?” How many kiloergs of climate energy did it release? There is no mention of the term in the body of the post.
When discussing “climate change” and bombshells in the same article, I believe Hiroshima’s is the correct unit of energy to be utilized.
I prefer energy flux in Nagasakis per Manhattan.
How many Olympic-size swimming pools is that (or is it Wadhams)?
I prefer my bombshells blonde. 😁
That would make complete sense. AGW bed-wetters of my acquaintance hate being confronted with IPCC assessments. They are so deep into their nonsense they see even the IPCC as “climate denying” when I do that.
To repeat something I’ve said often here: the IPCC exists to make the best case for AGW not to assess the evidence objectively. But that is not good enough for the zealots.
Nothing is ever good enough for zealots… that’s how you can identify them!
When they start to ignore their holy bible, IPCC reports it is clear they are too far gone as they are on the way into the abyss.
At this point, climate attribution is akin to conditioned reflex. Pavlov was right; ring a bell and the kennel salivates.
Confirmation bias on steroids.
The MSM no longer deals in fact but rather in opinion or observing an editorial agenda. That agenda is, unfortunately, usually political and currently Leftist in the majority. It is folly to expect truth when propaganda is the tool needed to sway public opinion.
The good news is that they are rapidly losing their credibility.
‘The good news is that they are rapidly losing their credibility.’
Not rapidly enough. Any economic downturn set in motion by the ‘Biden’ regime’s policies will be blamed on Trump and his Republican allies, likely leading to major losses in the 2026 mid-terms.
Yes, the economic damage Biden and the Democrats have already done could have the economy heading for a recession. There have been lots of bankruptcies and layoff over the last few years, and those are caused by a slowing economy, which is caused by the enormous inflation we are all having to deal with.
Groceries, gasoline, and utility bills take more money out of people’s pockets which means they have less money to spend on other things. And the people selling those “other things” are harmed because their business is not doing as well as it did, to the point that some businesses have to layoff workers to stay in business, and some have to close up shop.
Spending by Americans makes up about 75 percent of U.S. GDP.
American’s ability to spend has been hampered by higher costs for everything, so we will see just how hampered it has been in the future.
The American economy is strong. And there is a lot of optimism out there with the election of Trump, and foreign businesses and investors are already flocking to the United States, so maybe that activity will offset some of the Biden/Democrat hits to the economy.
“A less charitable explanation is that there is a systematic effort underway to contest and undermine actual climate science, including the assessments of the IPCC, in order to present a picture of reality that is simply false in support of climate advocacy. We might call that pseudo-scientific gaslighting,” he [Roger Pielke] suggests.
The actual explanation is that there is a systematic effort underway by the Left to promote and weaponize junk science climate alarmism in order to seize total economic and political power.
Reality and ‘climate science’ have no overlap on a Venn diagram. This post is just another proof of that fact.
Seeing “climate science” has been badly compromised by certain groups, maybe what is being presented by the groups challenging the narrative is “climate data”.
Then there’s the claims of increases in heat related deaths, even though such would be swamped by decreased cold related deaths — it’s widely accepted that severe cold causes 5X-9X more deaths than severe heat (Lancet 2023)
“30 Year Global Drop in Hurricane Frequency and Power”
uh huh! That proves it- climate change! 🙂
I have a question for the meteorologists among you. When I look at global wind patterns with pressures and isobars at this time of year using the Windy App, I see very large low pressure systems at very high latitudes with winds up to 100 kph.
For instance, as I look at it right now (Noon U.S. E.S.T. 05-01-2025) there is a system in the North Atlantic with its central isobars just off the southeastern tip of Newfoundland). It shows a central pressure of 957 mb. The highest wind speeds I see on the App are less than 100 kph.
According to my chart of the Safir-Simpson scale, 957 mb characterizes a Cat 3 hurricane with wind speeds from 178 to 209 kph.
What is the source of this discrepancy? Is it the season? Water temperatures?
So it’s CO2 that is going to wreck our civilisation. I thought people had given up on CO2. Since COP1 in Berlin in 1995 the Keeling curve has continued upwards at c. 2ppm a year and is unstoppable whether natural or Asian coal burning. Why didn’t the COVID deindustrialisation show up at Moana Loa? Perhaps it’s all natural. Relax everybody and do stop your mad raving.
The problem is “mainstream media,” “green activists,” other “cause chasing politician activists” who are not confronting their own “Intentional” confirmation biases… and why do they have “confirmation biases,” it is because they think they can gain personally by supporting the latest “cause of the day.” They need to be challenged based on the demonstrable facts and if the facts are not demonstrable they need to be EXPOSED and SHAMED for their self centered – self serving dishonesty also known as bullshit.
Pictures, diagrams, graphs: those always make an article better.
What should we expect to happen when climate scientists tell us “our science is settled”, other than the immediate cessation of their research, positions and pay. Clear the departments clean out.
That might make room for a better quality workforce which really is curious about how weather works and why it does what it does rather than the truckloads of fantasies some folk have about the future… .
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” Upton Sinclaire
I have my own take on cyclones, “little measurable change”. It seems to be common knowledge that polar temperatures are increasing more than tropical temperatures. Winter temperatures are increasing more than summer temperatures and night time temperatures are increasing more than daytime temperatures.
This leads to lower differential temperatures. Differentials are the food of weather events. Differential temperatures lead to differential atmospheric pressures, the cause of air movement or winds. You can see where this chain of events leads; mixing different temperatures with different dew points.
Lower differentials reduce the possibility for formation of weather events.
“It seems to be common knowledge that polar temperatures are increasing more than tropical temperatures.”
No, that is a common piece of misinformation.
Here is UAH NoPol this century.
BeNasty is lying again
Climate claptrap comment number 130
According to the UAH satellite data, the North Pole temperature trend since 2000 shows a significant warming trend, with the Arctic region experiencing warming at a rate faster than the global average, although some analysis suggests the UAH data may show a slightly slower warming trend compared to other datasets in recent years; this warming is particularly noticeable in the summer months.
NO EVIDENCE.. just yap.. The dickie-boi way. !
Anyone can see the NoPol data above, and the 2016 El Nino spike that gives a FAKE linear warming trend if you give a ruler to a monkey..
Most of the surface warming in the Arctic comes from 2 or 3 expanding urban towns .. eg Barrow… this is spread across huge areas where it shouldn’t be applied.
UAH shows NoPol linear trends (which, as shown above are not linear by come from a single spike) warming very slightly fast in winter than in summer.. so dickie is wrong yet again.
Climate Baloney #131
Empty sack .. zero brains.. no evidence.. has to be Dickie-boi. !
“Most of the surface warming in the Arctic comes from 2 or 3 expanding urban towns .. eg Barrow… this is spread across huge areas where it shouldn’t be applied.”
Mr nicely, and just how does a satellite register warming “from 2 or 3 expanding urban towns .. eg Barrow”?
If you are saying that there is yet more magical heat available from there, that is elevated and warming a layer extending up to 7km, with a central weight at 3km, then you really are away with the Fairies.
RG – the UAH image below shows decadal warming rates since 1978. I’ve highlighted the three regions with the most significant warming trends.
The highest warming rates are in the northern hemisphere, including the Arctic. Why would this be?
Equally troublesome are the two highlighted areas in the southern hemisphere, one in the middle of the Pacific and the other just north of Antarctica.
Would love an explanation as to why this well-mixed CO2 gas has been so selective in its global warming rate response.
Weather satellites have poor coverage of the North and South Poles due to the Earth’s curvature and the position of the satellites in space:
CO2 most affects colder areas except for Antarctica which has a permanent temperature inversion over most of the continent. The Arctic is warming primarily in the winter because of the rapid decline in sea ice, which acts like a reflective lid, and when it melts, the underlying ocean absorbs much more sunlight, leading to increased heat gain, especially during the winter months when the sun is at a low angle in the sky and the dark ocean surface is exposed for longer periods;
Arctic summer ice is declining faster than winter ice primarily because during the summer months, the Arctic experiences extended periods of sunlight, leading to significantly more melting of sea ice compared to the relatively shorter winter period when ice can refreeze; this is further exacerbated by warming ocean temperatures, which accelerate the melting process in the summer months.
The local climate changes are a net effect of all global, regional and local climate variables, not just CO2.
The middle of the Pacific Ocean, particularly the central and eastern equatorial regions, can warm faster than other areas due to the natural climate pattern known as El Niño, where trade winds weaken, allowing warm water from the western Pacific to move eastward, leading to a significant rise in surface temperatures in that area; this phenomenon is amplified by the large expanse of the Pacific Ocean, allowing for large-scale heat redistribution. The ENSO cycle is temperature neutral in the long run of 30 to 50 years. But CO2 in the atmosphere is increasing, and that impedes all ocean’s ability to cool themselves.
While satellites are a valuable tool for monitoring El Niño events by tracking changes in sea surface temperature (SST), they are not considered the most accurate method for directly measuring the heat release associated with El Niño, as they primarily measure the brightness of the Earth’s atmosphere rather than surface temperatures, requiring complex calculations to translate that data into temperature information;
There are undersea volcanoes located in the Southern Ocean, particularly near the South Sandwich Islands, which lie just north of Antarctica; scientists from the British Antarctic Survey have discovered a chain of underwater volcanoes in this region using seafloor mapping technology
“ rapid decline in sea ice”
roflmao !!.
Hasn’t been any decline in Arctic sea ice since 2007. !
“and that impedes all ocean’s ability to cool themselves.”
Scientifically unsubstantiated nonsense.
There is no empirical evidence that CO2 has any effect in the atmosphere.
You keep proving that.
And if you eat water melon that impedes your next door neighbour’s ability to sleep.
“The local climate changes are a net effect of all global, regional and local climate variables, not just CO2.”
Only is-as-much as CO2 effects local vegetation.. and this is only local.. not global.
(Just like urban warming is local, not global)
You have shown conclusively that there is no empirical evidence that atmospheric CO2 causes any warming.
“there is no empirical evidence that atmospheric CO2 causes any warming.”
Except there is. The specific heat capacity of CO2 affects the specific heat capacity of air (Cp). A higher concentration CO2 means less energy is needed to raise the temperature. The absolute of any warming is false. What is true is it is insignificant, but not zero.
El Ninos warm more than La Ninas cool.
Not much evidence of La Nina cooling in the UAH data.. mainly because it is a recharge period, and may or may not decide to cool.
For the delectation of mr nicely does it ….
“Global monthly average lower troposphere temperature since 1979 for the North Pole and South Pole regions, based on satellite observations (University of Alabama at Huntsville, USA). This graph uses data obtained by the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) TIROS-N satellite, interpreted by Dr. Roy Spencer and Dr. John Christy, both at Global Hydrology and Climate Center, University of Alabama at Huntsville, USA. Thick lines are the simple running 37 month average, nearly corresponding to a running 3 yr average. Click here to read about data smoothing. Click here to download the entire series of UAH MSU global monthly lower troposphere temperatures since December 1978. Reference period 1991-2020. Last month shown: November 2024. Last diagram update: 12 December 2024.”
Charts: Based on scale I’d say looks like nothing worth arguing (scales vs range)
No warming in the Arctic, eh?
I beg to differ:
Assuminng “Nopol” is the same as the Arctic (60N-85N).
So the top graph shows a warming of 0.5C since 1016, and ~ 1C since 2000.
The bottom graph shows a similar warming of ~1C from 2000 to 2018.
And don’t move the goal-posts nicely, by fixating on the Antarctic graph.
You, and therfore me in replying, are talking about only the Arctic.
Also means less wind to turn the virtue propellers.
a curiously precise estimate
With a model significant digits are not a problem
However, their output is pure garbage.
“curiously precise estimate”
An oxymoron. An estimate is never precise otherwise it would not be an estimate.
We agree.
Roger is of course right. It is fully run on attribution with settled underlying assumptions. The problem is that the data does not seem to play ball. Never mind, they use a warped sense of logic to point the finger at the ‘right’ spot. You know, the one where it needs to land whatever in or output. The end justifies the means..
Very nice Chris. Number one there is no reason to be charitable to these monsters, they are liars and cheats. We need to directly challenge individuals making these blatantly false claims. Not just Paul, we need to gather a panel of experts in several fields climate, meteorology, physics, math, statistics, geology, biology, oceanography, atmospherics and so on. These people need to be fearless and articulate by that I mean they can communicate to the average guy but be able to put these phony climate science pretenders in their place if they try to deceive us with a bunch of fancy talk.
US major (Cat 3+) hurricanes have been in a declining trend since the late 1800s.
Less powerful hurricanes and those that did not make landfall are excluded because they were too likely to be missed before the satellite age.
Japanese typhoons have been a declining trend since 1954
According to available information, reliable records for the Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE) index, which is used to measure hurricane activity, generally began around the mid-20th century, with the most consistent data starting around 1951. But the ACE index undercounted tropical storms before about 2000, so data after 2000 should not be compared with data before 2000.
Unless one is inclined to prepare a hockey stick chart.
It is cold over much of the US and forecast to staying in freezing temperatures for at least a month.
January 15, is about the coldest part of the winter in the U.S., so the cold weather is right on time.
It’s not that cold, relatively. It’s not an extreme arctic cold front sinking all the way to the Gulf Coast.
We may get one of those before the winter is over, but this is not it. We are getting milder air off the Pacific Ocean at this time. It’s cold enough for ice and snow, but not the extreme cold of a full-blown arctic cold front. That’s good news.
“We might call that pseudo-scientific gaslighting” … its what I call “Opiense” Opinion dressed up as science …