By Joe Larese, The (Westchester County, N.Y.) Journal NewsAn SUV attempts to cross a flooded section of Route 9 on Aug. 28 in Cortlandt, N.Y. Hurricane Irene dropped record-breaking amounts of rain in the lower Hudson Valley.
By Joe Larese, The (Westchester County, N.Y.) Journal NewsAn SUV attempts to cross a flooded section of Route 9 on Aug. 28 in Cortlandt, N.Y. Hurricane Irene dropped record-breaking amounts of rain in the lower Hudson Valley.
Last year was particularly awful for weather in the USA, with at least 14 weather and climate disasters across the nation that each inflicted more than $1 billion in damage. They included a series of devastating tornado outbreaks in the central and southern USA, the ongoing drought in the southern Plains, massive river flooding along the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, and batterings from Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee. Environment America's report looks broadly at county-level weather-related disaster declarations from FEMA for 2006 through 2011 to find out how many Americans live in counties hit by recent weather disasters. The report focused on weather and climate events, and did not include geological events such as earthquakes or volcanic eruptions."I think their analysis of the FEMA data is correct," said meteorologist Jeff Masters of the Weather Underground, who was not part of the report.Whether directly tied to climate change or not, The number of Americans impacted by weather calamities in recent years is sobering:•From 2006 to 2011, federally declared weather-related disasters have occurred in 2,466 of the 3,068 counties, parishes or boroughs across the USA. •During that time, weather-related disasters have been declared in every U.S. state except South Carolina.•Also during this period, weather-related disasters affected every county in 18 states.If climate change is helping to fuel some of these disasters, as Environment America claims in the report, the group argues the onslaught of catastrophes could become the norm in decades to come."Global warming increases the likelihood" of more extreme weather, said Nathan Willcox, Environment America's federal global warming program director.The United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) last November also reported that disasters such as heat waves, floods and other weather events will likely worsen with global warming."Given that global warming will likely fuel even more extreme weather, we need to cut dangerous carbon pollution now," says Willcox. The burning of fossil fuels such as oil, gas and coal — and the resulting release of excess amounts of carbon dioxide — is what's most scientists say is causing global warming. Reducing the output of these "greenhouse" gases is the goal of most environmental groups.Masters said the report does an "excellent job" highlighting the impacts of climate change on extreme weather.But connecting specific extreme weather events with climate change is a slippery slope, counters Kristen Averyt, a scientist with the University of Colorado, who was also not part of the report. "Extreme events like the Texas drought are consistent with what we expect in a warmer world, but determining whether climate change caused or exacerbated a specific event is not easy."The answers are not just about mitigating greenhouse gas emissions — they're also about adaptation to events and reducing our vulnerabilities," she says.For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.