Download or read book Fixing the Sky written by James Rodger Fleming and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2010-08-13 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Weaving together stories from elite science, cutting-edge technology, and popular culture, Fleming examines issues of health and navigation in the 1830s, drought in the 1890s, aircraft safety in the 1930s, and world conflict since the 1940s.
Download or read book History of American Weather and Climate Modification written by National Weather Service and published by . This book was released on 2017-05-07 with total page 315 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ten unique government reports document the history of attempted weather and climate modification efforts, including Defense Department projections of future programs and a detailed history of Project Stormfury and related hurricane modification trials. Contents: A Recommended National Program In Weather Modification * Weather as a Force Multiplier: Owning the Weather in 2025 * Weather Modification Research and Development Policy Authorization Act of 2005 * Weather and Climate Modification: Report of the Special Commission on Weather Modification * Federal Weather Modification Efforts Need Congressional Attention * An Introduction to Weather Modification * Need for a National Weather Modification Research Program * Hurricane Modification * Project Stormfury * Hurricane Modification and Control Report (April 1971). Can human intervention diminish the force of a hurricane? From the mid-1960s through the early 1980s NOAA actively pursued Project STORMFURY, a program of experimental hurricane modification. The general strategy was to reduce the intensity of the storm by cloud seeding. The seeding, it was argued, would stimulate the formation of a new eyewall that would surround the existing eyewall. The new eyewall would contract, strangling the old eyewall and reducing the intensity of the hurricane. However, research carried out at AOML showed clearly that these "concentric eyewalls" happened often in unmodified hurricanes, thus casting doubt on the seemingly positive results of seeding in earlier experimentation. Hurricane Luis provides an example of this behavior. Moreover, observations showed that hurricanes contain little of the supercooled water necessary for cloud seeding to work. The American Meteorological Society policy statement on planned and inadvertent weather modification, dated October 2, 1998, indicates, "There is no sound physical hypothesis for the modification of hurricanes, tornadoes, or damaging winds in general, and no related scientific experimentation has been conducted in the past 20 years." In the absence of a sound hypothesis, no Federal agencies are presently doing, or planning, research on hurricane modification. Some techniques besides seeding clouds that have been considered over the years include: cooling the ocean with cryogenic material or icebergs, retardation of surface evaporation with monomolecular films, changing the radiational balance in the hurricane environment by absorption of sunlight with carbon black, blowing the hurricane apart with hydrogen bombs, injecting air into the center with a huge maneuverable tube to raise the central pressure, and blowing the storm away from land with windmills. As carefully reasoned as some of these suggestions are, they all fall short of the mark because they fail to appreciate the size and power of tropical cyclones. For example, when hurricane Andrew struck South Florida in 1992, the eye and eyewall devastated a swath 20 miles wide. The heat energy released around the eye was 5,000 times the combined heat and electrical power generation of the Turkey Point nuclear power plant over which the eye passed. Better building codes, wiser land use, and more accurate forecasts seem prosaic compared with environmental mega engineering but they are a great deal cheaper and have overwhelmingly favorable cost-benefit ratios.
Download or read book Make It Rain written by Kristine C. Harper and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2018-06-04 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Weather control. Juxtaposing those two words is enough to raise eyebrows in a world where even the best weather models still fail to nail every forecast, and when the effects of climate change on sea level height, seasonal averages of weather phenomena, and biological behavior are being watched with interest by all, regardless of political or scientific persuasion. But between the late nineteenth century—when the United States first funded an attempt to “shock” rain out of clouds—and the late 1940s, rainmaking (as it had been known) became weather control. And then things got out of control. In Make It Rain, Kristine C. Harper tells the long and somewhat ludicrous history of state-funded attempts to manage, manipulate, and deploy the weather in America. Harper shows that governments from the federal to the local became helplessly captivated by the idea that weather control could promote agriculture, health, industrial output, and economic growth at home, or even be used as a military weapon and diplomatic tool abroad. Clear fog for landing aircraft? There’s a project for that. Gentle rain for strawberries? Let’s do it! Enhanced snowpacks for hydroelectric utilities? Check. The heyday of these weather control programs came during the Cold War, as the atmosphere came to be seen as something to be defended, weaponized, and manipulated. Yet Harper demonstrates that today there are clear implications for our attempts to solve the problems of climate change.
Download or read book Braving the Elements written by David Laskin and published by Anchor. This book was released on 1997-06-16 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nowhere in the world is weather as volatile and powerful as it is in North America. Scorching heat in the Southwest, hurricanes on the Atlantic coast, tornadoes in the Plains, blizzards in the mountains: Every area of the country has vastly different weather, and vastly different cultures as a result. Braving the Elements is David Laskin's delightful and fascinating history of how our unique weather has shaped a nation, and how we've tried to cope with it over centuries. Since before Columbus, the peoples of America have struggled to make sense of the capricious and violent nature of America's weather. Anasazi Indians used the rain dance (and sometimes human sacrifice) to induce rain, while the Puritans in New England blamed the sins of the community for lightening strikes and Nor'easters. IN modern times we carry on those traditions by blaming the weatherman for ruined weekends. Despite hi-tech satellites and powerful computers and 24-hour-a-day forecasting from The Weather Channel, we're still at the mercy of the whims of Mother Nature. Laskin recounts the many dramatic moments in American weather history, from the "Little Ice Age" to Ben Franklin's invention of the lightning rod to the Great Blizzard of the 1930's to the worries about global warming. Packed with fresh insights and wonderful lore and trivia, Braving the Elements is unique and essential reading for anyone who's ever asked, "What's it like outside?"
Download or read book History of American Weather and Climate Modification written by Progressive Management and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ten unique government reports document the history of attempted weather and climate modification efforts, including Defense Department projections of future programs and a detailed history of Project Stormfury and related hurricane modification trials. Contents: A Recommended National Program In Weather Modification * Weather as a Force Multiplier: Owning the Weather in 2025 * Weather Modification Research and Development Policy Authorization Act of 2005 * Weather and Climate Modification: Report of the Special Commission on Weather Modification * Federal Weather Modification Efforts Need Congressional Attention * An Introduction to Weather Modification * Need for a National Weather Modification Research Program * Hurricane Modification * Project Stormfury * Hurricane Modification and Control Report (April 1971).Can human intervention diminish the force of a hurricane? From the mid-1960s through the early 1980s NOAA actively pursued Project STORMFURY, a program of experimental hurricane modification. The general strategy was to reduce the intensity of the storm by cloud seeding. The seeding, it was argued, would stimulate the formation of a new eyewall that would surround the existing eyewall. The new eyewall would contract, strangling the old eyewall and reducing the intensity of the hurricane. However, research carried out at AOML showed clearly that these "concentric eyewalls" happened often in unmodified hurricanes, thus casting doubt on the seemingly positive results of seeding in earlier experimentation. Hurricane Luis provides an example of this behavior. Moreover, observations showed that hurricanes contain little of the supercooled water necessary for cloud seeding to work.The American Meteorological Society policy statement on planned and inadvertent weather modification, dated October 2, 1998, indicates, "There is no sound physical hypothesis for the modification of hurricanes, tornadoes, or damaging winds in general, and no related scientific experimentation has been conducted in the past 20 years." In the absence of a sound hypothesis, no Federal agencies are presently doing, or planning, research on hurricane modification.Some techniques besides seeding clouds that have been considered over the years include: cooling the ocean with cryogenic material or icebergs, retardation of surface evaporation with monomolecular films, changing the radiational balance in the hurricane environment by absorption of sunlight with carbon black, blowing the hurricane apart with hydrogen bombs, injecting air into the center with a huge maneuverable tube to raise the central pressure, and blowing the storm away from land with windmills. As carefully reasoned as some of these suggestions are, they all fall short of the mark because they fail to appreciate the size and power of tropical cyclones. For example, when hurricane Andrew struck South Florida in 1992, the eye and eyewall devastated a swath 20 miles wide. The heat energy released around the eye was 5,000 times the combined heat and electrical power generation of the Turkey Point nuclear power plant over which the eye passed. Better building codes, wiser land use, and more accurate forecasts seem prosaic compared with environmental mega engineering but they are a great deal cheaper and have overwhelmingly favorable cost-benefit ratios.
Download or read book Weather and Climate Modification written by Wilmot N. Hess and published by Wiley-Interscience. This book was released on 1974 with total page 870 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New York, Wiley [1974].
Download or read book Weather and Climate Modification written by National Science Foundation (U.S.). Special Commission on Weather Modification and published by . This book was released on 1966 with total page 168 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Historical Perspectives on Climate Change written by James Rodger Fleming and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2005-07-14 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This intriguing volume provides a thorough examination of the historical roots of global climate change as a field of inquiry, from the Enlightenment to the late twentieth century. Based on primary and archival sources, the book is filled with interesting perspectives on what people have understood, experienced, and feared about the climate and its changes in the past. Chapters explore climate and culture in Enlightenment thought; climate debates in early America; the development of international networks of observation; the scientific transformation of climate discourse; and early contributions to understanding terrestrial temperature changes, infrared radiation, and the carbon dioxide theory of climate. But perhaps most important, this book shows what a study of the past has to offer the interdisciplinary investigation of current environmental problems.
Download or read book Weather written by Andrew Revkin and published by Union Square + ORM. This book was released on 2018-05-20 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From an award–winning journalist, a “beautifully illustrated” book describing “the most pivotal moments . . . in the climate’s rich . . . 4.5 billion-year history.” (The Washington Post) Colorful and captivating, Weather: An Illustrated History hopscotches through 100 meteorological milestones and insights, from prehistory to today’s headlines and tomorrow’s forecasts. Bite-sized narratives, accompanied by exciting illustrations, touch on such varied topics as Earth’s first atmosphere, the physics of rainbows, the deadliest hailstorm, Groundhog Day, the invention of air conditioning, London’s Great Smog, the Year Without Summer, our increasingly strong hurricanes, and the Paris Agreement on climate change. A groundbreaking work by prominent environmental journalist and author Andrew Revkin, Weather: An Illustrated History presents an intriguing history of humanity’s evolving relationship with Earth’s dynamic climate system and the wondrous weather it generates. “FINALLY, someone has done something about the weather. Andrew Revkin and Lisa Mechaley have given us a startlingly fascinating book about how weather got the way it is, and how we’ve reacted to it, used it, and even helped shape it. There are a hundred captivating stories in this book that are as enlightening as they are fun. Reading them is like seeing the clouds part and the sun come out.” —Alan Alda, longtime host of Scientific American Frontiers and a founder of the Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science at Stony Brook University ”Informative, addictively readable . . . Highly recommended.” —Nathaniel Philbrick, National Book Award winner for In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex ”A gift of a book—at once fascinating, informative, and surprising.” —Elizabeth Kolbert, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Sixth Extinction
Download or read book The Encyclopedia of Weather Climate Change written by Juliane Loraine Fry and published by Thomas Reed. This book was released on 2011 with total page 512 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This fantastic resource of weather and climate is incredibly comprehensive, interesting, wide ranging and beautifully presented. Written by a team of international experts, it provides an impressive overview of our globe, beginning with the foundations of weather and meteorology and ending with a detailed look at the issues surrounding climate change. With some of the world's finest landscape and satellite photography, and hundreds of detailed illustrations, cutaways, cross-sections, maps and charts, it provides easy to understand explanations of a complex subject. Section 1 discusses what weather is, how the seasons are formed, global atmospheric systems, temperature, air pressure, jet streams, frontal systems, sea breezes, waves and ocean climate. Section 2 explains the workings of weather phenomena such as cloud formation, humidity, rainbows, rain, hail, ice and snow. Section 3 covers devastating weather events: tornadoes, hurricanes, thunderstorms, lightning, flash floods, blizzards, droughts and record breaking weather. Section 4 covers the science of studying, watching and tracking weather, from ancient times to today. Section 5 tours the climate zones of the entire world, explaining the characteristics of each and their particular phenomena and trends. Section 6 provides a compelling portrait of the Earth and the effects of climate change, including ice ages, deforestation, acid rain, greenhouse effect, rising sea levels, wildfires, water shortages, and the effect on marine life. The Encyclopedia of Weather and Climate Change is a truly spectacular reference to all aspects of the world's weather.
Download or read book Attribution of Extreme Weather Events in the Context of Climate Change written by National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2016-07-28 with total page 187 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As climate has warmed over recent years, a new pattern of more frequent and more intense weather events has unfolded across the globe. Climate models simulate such changes in extreme events, and some of the reasons for the changes are well understood. Warming increases the likelihood of extremely hot days and nights, favors increased atmospheric moisture that may result in more frequent heavy rainfall and snowfall, and leads to evaporation that can exacerbate droughts. Even with evidence of these broad trends, scientists cautioned in the past that individual weather events couldn't be attributed to climate change. Now, with advances in understanding the climate science behind extreme events and the science of extreme event attribution, such blanket statements may not be accurate. The relatively young science of extreme event attribution seeks to tease out the influence of human-cause climate change from other factors, such as natural sources of variability like El Niño, as contributors to individual extreme events. Event attribution can answer questions about how much climate change influenced the probability or intensity of a specific type of weather event. As event attribution capabilities improve, they could help inform choices about assessing and managing risk, and in guiding climate adaptation strategies. This report examines the current state of science of extreme weather attribution, and identifies ways to move the science forward to improve attribution capabilities.
Download or read book Weather and Climate Modification Problems and Prospects Final Report of the Panel on Weather and Climate Modification written by National Research Council (U S. ). Commi and published by Franklin Classics Trade Press. This book was released on 2018-11-13 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
Download or read book The Weather Makers written by Tim Flannery and published by Open Road + Grove/Atlantic. This book was released on 2007-12-01 with total page 445 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The #1 international bestseller on climate change that’s been endorsed by policy makers, scientists, writers, and energy executives around the world. Tim Flannery’s The Weather Makers contributed in bringing the topic of global warming to worldwide prominence. For the first time, a scientist provided an accessible and comprehensive account of the history, current status, and future impact of climate change, writing what has been acclaimed by reviewers everywhere as the definitive book on global warming. With one out of every five living things on this planet committed to extinction by the levels of greenhouse gases that will accumulate in the next few decades, we are reaching a global climatic tipping point. The Weather Makers is both an urgent warning and a call to arms, outlining the history of climate change, how it will unfold over the next century, and what we can do to prevent a cataclysmic future. Originally somewhat of a global warming skeptic, Tim Flannery spent several years researching the topic and offers a connect-the-dots approach for a reading public who has received patchy or misleading information on the subject. Pulling on his expertise as a scientist to discuss climate change from a historical perspective, Flannery also explains how climate change is interconnected across the planet. This edition includes a new afterword by the author. “An authoritative, scientifically accurate book on global warming that sparkles with life, clarity, and intelligence.” —The Washington Post
Download or read book Historical Climate Variability and Impacts in North America written by Lesley-Ann Dupigny-Giroux and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2009-09-18 with total page 279 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Climatologists with an eye on the past have any number of sources for their work, from personal diaries to weather station reports. Piecing together the trajectory of a weather event can thus be a painstaking process taking years and involving real detective work. Missing pieces of a climate puzzle can come from very far afield, often in unlikely places. In this book, a series of case studies examine specific regions across North America, using instrumental and documentary data from the 17th to the 19th centuries. Extreme weather events such as the Sitka hurricane of 1880 are recounted in detail, while the chapters also cover more widespread phenomena such as the collapse of the Low Country rice culture. The book also looks at the role of weather station histories in complementing the instrumental record, and sets out the methods that involve early instrumental and documentary climate data. Finally, the book’s focus on North America reflects the fact that the historical climate community there has only grown relatively recently. Up to now, most such studies have focused on Europe and Asia. The four sections begin with regional case studies, and move on to reconstruct extreme events and parameters. This is followed by the role of station history and, lastly, methodologies and other analyses. The editors’ aim has been to produce a volume that would be instrumental in molding the next generation of historical climatologists. They designed this book for use by general researchers as well as in upper-level undergraduate or graduate level courses.
Download or read book Weather on the Air written by Robert Henson and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-01-05 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From low humor to high drama, TV weather reporting has encompassed an enormous range of styles and approaches, triggering chuckles, infuriating the masses, and at times even saving lives. In Weather on the Air, meteorologist and science journalist Robert Henson covers it all—the people, technology, science, and show business that combine to deliver the weather to the public each day. Featuring the long-term drive to professionalize weathercasting; the complex relations between government and private forecasters; and the effects of climate-change science and the Internet on today’s broadcasts. With dozens of photos and anecdotes illuminating the many forces that have shaped weather broadcasts over the years, this engaging study will be an invaluable tool for students of broadcast meteorology and mass communication and an entertaining read for anyone fascinated by the public face of weather.
Download or read book Managing Water Resources in the West Under Conditions of Climate Uncertainty written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 1991-02-01 with total page 359 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The question of whether the earth's climate is changing in some significant human-induced way remains a matter of much debate. But the fact that climate is variable over time is well known. These two elements of climatic uncertainty affect water resources planning and management in the American West. Managing Water Resources in the West Under Conditions of Climate Uncertainty examines the scientific basis for predictions of climate change, the implications of climate uncertainty for water resources management, and the management options available for responding to climate variability and potential climate change.
Download or read book Making Climate Change History written by Joshua P. Howe and published by University of Washington Press. This book was released on 2017-04-03 with total page 380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection pulls together key documents from the scientific and political history of climate change, including congressional testimony, scientific papers, newspaper editorials, court cases, and international declarations. Far more than just a compendium of source materials, the book uses these documents as a way to think about history, while at the same time using history as a way to approach the politics of climate change from a new perspective. Making Climate Change History provides the necessary background to give readers the opportunity to pose critical questions and create plausible answers to help them understand climate change in its historical context; it also illustrates the relevance of history to building effective strategies for dealing with the climatic challenges of the future.
