Would someone please explain to me, or at least point me to a good link, that explains the mechanism by which climate change causes extreme weather.
I found this at a state.gov site:
"Carbon dioxide (CO2) from cars, industries and power plants trap heat near the earth's surface. More heat means more energy. Adding so much energy to the atmosphere creates the potential for more extremes." And then it goes on to outline all the effects.. death, destruction, high timber prices, etc.
Well, "More heat means more energy" doesn't cut it. Regional differences in air temperature (and pressure) are indeed what cause extreme weather. But I don't see how a
global increase in temperature increases the pressure/temperature differential required to generate those weather events. An increase in 0.65C over 100 years pales in comparison to the daily temperature swings caused by the earth's rotation. And what keeps that 0.65C increase concentrated in areas that would magnify weather events, and out of areas where the warmth would mellow the weather out? A uniformly warm system has no more usable energy than a uniformly cool system. That's not science-denial, it's just basic thermodynamics.
I understand how a small change over a large area can funnel down to a large change in a small area, for example a slight breeze across the fruited plain turning into high winds between two mountains. Or a small increase in evaporation over an entire ocean causing a buildup of clouds that end up dumping a lot of rain or snow on a small town. Again, I don't see how a global temperature change makes a difference. If the high temperature areas are heated an extra degree, so should be cold areas, making for no increase in the difference. If the atmosphere in general is heated to where it can hold more moisture, then it just
does hold more moisture, and there is nothing inherent to the heat itself that would keep a "hot side hot, cold side cold" and cause high winds, or for precipitation to select anywhere in particular to fall.
I understand there can be catastrophic runaway cycles like the greenhouse effect on Venus.. and that (thankfully) there are limit cycles, like the increased cloud cover bouncing more sunlight back into space so the earth absorbs less heat.. or the increased absorption of CO2 by plants, a portion of which will eventually fold into the earth's crust just as plants did to make the fossil fuels we are burning now (geologic timescale, yes we know..)
Sure, there are correlations between the current warm period and extreme weather events.. and the perennial news-puke going on about a typhoon or record temperature in this or that location. Those correlations may well have a causal mechanism behind them that I am not seeing. Maybe there is a good paper on it that someone can point me to. Have researchers run computer models with the air at one temperature, then raised it half a degree and found a higher incidence of storms? And if they have, have they got a nutshell explanation for us laymen? Understanding how it works would go a long way toward people accepting that there is a causal relationship at all, and not just write it off as media hype. I'd never expect someone who is even remotely scientific in their thinking to accept the word "science" as an explanation.
If the extra CO2 is causing an increased temperature gradient with respect to elevation, I can see that increasing weather activity in general. That is how lava lamps work. The bulb heats the bottom, the waxy stuff melts and expands, rises to the top, cools and drops. Put the same lava lamp in an oven and heat it uniformly, and nothing will move. So under the lava lamp theory
I don't think global warming is bad per se. But then, to heat a lava lamp in an oven is analogous to heating the whole earth & atmosphere evenly.. probably not what's meant by "climate change."
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