Remember When We Were Warned That Global Warming Would Increase Hurricanes?

 9/15/26 Ars Technica:

Last week, the Atlantic hurricane season blew through its traditional peak—which comes around September 10—with nary a tropical wave in sight, let alone a storm or hurricane.

This is remarkable. Usually this is the time of year when sea surface temperatures reach their warmest in the tropics, and with a favorable atmosphere it should be smooth skating for tropical systems. But this year, the main region where most tropical systems develop is choked with Saharan dust and wind shear.

No one is complaining. Landfalling hurricanes are incredibly destructive for coastal areas and have the potential for considerable inland rainfall. Even storms at sea, in the Gulf of Mexico, can send energy prices skyrocketing—the last thing needed this year.
This has never happened

Nevertheless, the quietude is historic.

Beginning in 1944, the United States began monitoring the Atlantic basin, which includes the Gulf, Caribbean Sea, and northern Atlantic Ocean, with aircraft to detect hurricanes. Dating back to 1944, a hurricane had formed every year by September 11. The latest “first” Atlantic hurricanes came in 2002, with Gustav, and in 2013, with Humberto on this date.

Atlantic hurricane records officially go back to 1851, although older records are less reliable because observations of storms developing at sea were reliant on reports from shipping vessels. So some storms were missed. If we extend the hurricane record all the way back to 1851, every year still records at least one Atlantic hurricane. But in 1941, the first hurricane did not form until September 17. This is the date of the latest first Atlantic hurricane on record.

I’m here to tell you that the Atlantic will not produce a hurricane by the end of Thursday. The National Hurricane Center is presently monitoring a single disturbance in the Atlantic, but it gives this system a “near zero” percent chance of becoming a tropical depression or storm during the next two days. The likelihood of it ever becoming a hurricane is low.

Arizona Hot Tomorrow

 It will be 113 Thursday. Un like 1994 when Lake Havasu had 128.

Record Heat!

 Actually, no. This is the data on record high temperatures by state and in which year. I am trying to do what should be simple: plot a map showing year and maximum temperature by state. It is harder than it looks. Can any of you tell me how to do this?

State,Record High (°F),Year,Date,Location

Alabama,112,1925,"September 6, 1925",Centreville

Alaska,100,1915,"June 27, 1915",Fort Yukon

Arizona,128,1994,"June 29, 1994",Lake Havasu City

Arkansas,120,1936,"August 10, 1936",Ozark

California,134,1913,"July 10, 1913",Greenland Ranch (Death Valley)

Colorado,115,2019,"July 20, 2019",John Martin Reservoir

Connecticut,106,1995,"July 15, 1995",Danbury

Delaware,110,1930,"July 21, 1930",Millsboro

District of Columbia,106,1930,"July 20, 1930",Washington

Florida,109,1931,"June 29, 1931",Monticello

Georgia,112,1983,"August 20, 1983",Greenville

Hawaii,100,1931,"April 27, 1931",Pahala

Idaho,118,1934,"July 28, 1934",Orofino

Illinois,117,1954,"July 14, 1954",East Saint Louis

Indiana,116,1936,"July 14, 1936",Collegeville

Iowa,118,1934,"July 20, 1934",Keokuk

Kansas,121,1936,"July 24, 1936",Alton

Kentucky,116,1930,"July 28, 1930",Louisville

Louisiana,114,1936,"August 10, 1936",Plain Dealing

Maine,105,1911,"July 10, 1911",North Bridgton

Maryland,109,1988,"June 21, 1988",Conowingo Dam & Darlington

Massachusetts,107,1975,"August 2, 1975",New Bedford

Michigan,112,1936,"July 13, 1936",Mio

Minnesota,115,1917,"July 29, 1917",Beardsley

Mississippi,115,1930,"July 29, 1930",Holly Springs

Missouri,118,1954,"July 14, 1954",Warsaw

Montana,117,1937,"July 5, 1937",Medicine Lake

Nebraska,118,1936,"July 24, 1936",Minden

Nevada,125,1994,"June 29, 1994",Laughlin

New Hampshire,106,1911,"July 4, 1911",Nashua

New Jersey,110,1936,"July 10, 1936",Runyon

New Mexico,122,1994,"June 27, 1994",Waste Isolation Pilot Plant

New York,108,1926,"July 22, 1926",Troy

North Carolina,110,1983,"August 21, 1983",Fayetteville

North Dakota,121,1936,"July 6, 1936",Steele

Ohio,113,1934,"July 21, 1934",Gallipolis

Oklahoma,120,1994,"June 27, 1994",Tipton

Oregon,119,2021,"June 29, 2021",Pelton Dam

Pennsylvania,111,1936,"July 10, 1936",Phoenixville

Rhode Island,104,1975,"August 2, 1975",Providence

South Carolina,113,2012,"June 29, 2012",Columbia

South Dakota,120,2006,"July 15, 2006",Fort Pierre

Tennessee,113,1930,"August 9, 1930",Perryville

Texas,120,1994,"June 28, 1994",Monahans

Utah,117,2021,"July 10, 2021",St. George

Vermont,105,1911,"July 4, 1911",Vernon

Virginia,110,1954,"July 15, 1954",Balcony Falls

Washington,120,2021,"June 29, 2021",Hanford Site

West Virginia,112,1936,"July 10, 1936",Martinsburg

Wisconsin,114,1936,"July 13, 1936",Wisconsin Dells

Wyoming,115,1988,"July 15, 1988",Diversion Dam

The Declining Importance of the Strsight of Hormuz

No, not a MAGA talking point. 6/4/26 New York Times:

But with every passing day, the world is learning to live without the Gulf’s seaborne exports.

1Just as the Covid-19 pandemic and President Trump’s tariffs forced a significant rewiring of global supply chains, the Strait’s closure has prompted a similar adjustment. You might be part of it. When gas prices rise rapidly, people start to limit their driving. Walmart just reported that customers are now buying less than 10 gallons of gas at a time on average at its filling stations.

The United States, Brazil, Canada, Kazakhstan and Venezuela are already increasing their oil production. Large releases of crude oil from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve are also helping to cover shortfalls. Like a stream that finds its way around a fallen log, markets locate new supplies when the old ones are suddenly cut off.

At some point, the Iranian crazies will get poor enough for their religious objections to evaporate. By then, Iran will be a less important source of oil. And on the bright side, reduced consumption of oil will make the world a better place for Greenies.

Entertaining Explanation for Why Coal is Not Going Away

 And particularly why China, India, and Indonesia are not giving It up. Listen carefully while Mother Earth and Greta Thunberg cry. Hint: where we buy our products just exports coal burning.

Global Warming Willl Starve Us All

 12/15/25 Reuters:

Earlier this month, the Canadian government announced record harvests of spring wheat and canola for 2025. And because most of the grains produced in Canada are shipped and consumed abroad, those gains have major implications for the rest of the world's ability to feed itself affordably.

Australia, another large global grain exporter, has also reported rising crop yields despite drier conditions

.

You might almost wonder if increased plant food in the atmosphere makes crops grow better.

EV Tax Credits As Subsidy to Car Makers

11/2/25 Fortune:

Goodbye, tax credits: President Donald Trump’s tax and budget bill ended tax credits of up to $7,500 on eligible EV purchases as of Sept. 30, and EV demand is expected to cool without federal incentives. Rivian recently cut 4.5% of its workforce, or about 600 workers, The Wall Street Journal reported.

“With the changing operating backdrop, we had to rethink how we are scaling our go-to-market functions,” CEO RJ Scaringe wrote to employees, per the WSJ.

Pricing starts above $70,000 for the EV maker’s current passenger vehicles.

“It meant that we needed to reduce our costs in our vehicle roadmap,” McDonough said of the end of the EV tax credits. “And the key strategy for us is to bring to market a more mass-market-priced product, which is coming out next year.”

The excuse that I hear from green EV fans is that a new technology needs subsidies to develop.  Subsidies reduce consumer costs allowing a larger market.  Rivian seems to think that losing the tax credits will require them to cut costs.  This should increase demand.  Wow!  Maybe free markets are a better way!

Those Miocene Telocerases and Their Jets

10/21/25 Nature Geoscience:

The sensitivity of terrestrial Arctic climate during the Late Miocene remains poorly understood, despite this interval marking the transition towards a cooler, more variable global climate and the prelude to Northern Hemisphere glaciation. Here we present a Late Miocene terrestrial proxy record, developed through the analysis of speleothems, from eastern North Greenland (Kalaallit Nunaat). Growth periods indicate multiple episodes of permafrost absence between ~10 and 5 Ma, suggesting mean annual air temperatures ~14 °C higher than present coinciding with atmospheric CO2 concentrations above ~310 ppm and local sea surface temperature anomalies >2 °C higher than present. Such moderate thresholds for permafrost absence highlight the climate sensitivity of North Greenland. Spikes in siliciclastic-derived trace elements ~6.3 and ~5.6 Ma are interpreted as terrestrial indicators for Late Miocene ephemeral glaciers in North Greenland. Climate variability recorded during speleothem growth periods was predominantly forced by obliquity,

Telocerase:

 

There Goes the Amazon

9/26/25 LiveScience:

Trees of all sizes across the Amazon rainforest are getting fatter due to climate change, a new study shows.

Rising carbon dioxide (CO₂) concentrations in the atmosphere have created a more resource-rich environment for plants in the Amazon, leading to an average 3.3% increase in the circumference of trees at their base every decade since the 1970s, researchers have found."

Of course, there is the obligatory "This may get worse" warning.  But really, this is no surprise.   Most systems show a strong preference for equilibrium.  If you put salt in water, it dissolves...until the point where as many molecules come out of solution as dissolve.  The trees are drawing down CO2 with gusto.  Oh, and imminent starvation?  Another plant is getting its share.  Wheat production increased from 592 million metric tons in 1990/91 to 793 million metric tons in 2024/25.  Some of that might be superior breeds of wheat or more fertilizer but wheat is not at risk.

When a Bill of Rights Was Debated

 Those who said it was not needed talked about the risk that we might leave on out and that absence would later be found to be evidence that no such right existed.  One of these clever sorts asked if there was a need for a right to bury our dead?  Before you laugh, England for a couple centuries required that you be buried in wool.  So this 9/13/25 Telegraph article is no surprise:

Labour is plotting to make UK crematoria greener by banning gas cremation ovens and forcing grieving families to choose eco-friendly wicker or bamboo coffins.

New rules for crematoria, drawn up by the UK environment department, are set to be upgraded to meet both new pollution standards and the UK’s commitment to reach the target of net zero by 2050 championed by Energy Secretary, Ed Miliband.

Under the plan, the Government will seek to cut emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants, including mercury from dental fillings, and airborne toxins from burning coffin glue and embalming fluid.

CO2 Storage in Permafrost

More precisely, the evidence shows thst permafrost assists in storing carbon in plants in less.  8/30/25 Phys.org:

"Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere vary naturally between ice ages and interglacial periods. A new study by researchers at the University of Gothenburg shows that an unexpectedly large proportion of carbon dioxide emissions after the ice age may have come from thawing permafrost."

If you look at long-term graphs of CO2 and global temperature, you often see temperatures rise before CO2 increases.  So CO2 may be the symptom not the cause. 

Those Prairie-Canadians Are Getting Uppity

Canada's national government has been doing its best to get to Net Zero by many methods including high carbon taxes.  Saskatchewan has long relied on coal for power.  Wind power sometimes drop to zero and solar power era reliably drops to zero on some poorly understood schedule that is probably an oil company conspiracy. 

6/18/25 PipelineOnline.ca:

"REGINA, ESTEVAN, CORONACH – For years, the conventional coal-fired power industry in Saskatchewan has been living under a death sentence, one to be carried out in four years, six months and 12 days from now. Federal regulations proclaimed the end of coal-fired power generation in Canada by 2030 as a way of reducing Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions to combat anthropogenic (manmade) climate change.

"On Wednesday, June 18, the Government of Saskatchewan issued a stay of execution, as it were. On that day, Minister of Crown Investments Corporation Minister and Minister Responsible for SaskPower Jeremy Harrison sent a letter to SaskPower workers, informing them that instead of shutting down its coal fleet, SaskPower would be rebuilding it, and operating it for years to come, as a bridge to nuclear power generation. That eventual nuclear adoption would lead to net zero emissions by 2050. That letter was also forwarded to Westmoreland Coal, which mines the lignite coal for Saskatchewan’s three coal-fired power stations."

We're All Going to Drown!

2/15/25 LiveScience:

"Parts of California's coastline around Los Angeles and San Francisco are sinking, which means sea levels could rise more than twice as much as previously predicted in those areas."

Scary.  A little deeper:

""In many parts of the world, like the reclaimed ground beneath San Francisco, the land is moving down faster than the sea itself is going up," study lead author Marin Govorcin, a remote sensing scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said in a statement.

"The rising and sinking of land, which the researchers called "vertical land motion," are driven by natural processes, such as the movement of tectonic plates, and human factors, like the pumping of groundwater, according to the study."

Even if the seas are rising, measuring that by looking at beach sea level is problematic. 

Are the Oceans Rising?

One of the preferred narratives to terrify people about global warming is rising oceans.  For some odd reason,  people who make either money or political advantage from global warming seem partial to homes near the current oceanfront.   Like Al Gore.  And Barack Obama.

Do I criticize their desire for ocean views?  Not at all.  I would like to live on the beach or at least with an ocean view.  But it suggests that they are not worried about whether their kids will have road access to the property (for Gore) or flooding in the front door (for Obama).

But are the oceans rising?  Complicating the problem is that (according to NOAA):

"Even the stronges materials (including the Earth's crust) move, or deform, when enough pressure is applied. So when ice by the megaton settled on parts of the Earth for several thousand years, the ice bore down on the land beneath it, and the land rose up beyond the ice's perimeter—just like the mattress did when you lay down on and then got up off of it."

Wikipedia has a map of Finland's rise because of this.  

The black lines are the Ice Age sea levels.  And this is despite the 120 meter rise in sea levels as the glaciers melted.

Also:

"In Sweden, Lake Mälaren was formerly an arm of the Baltic Sea, but uplift eventually cut it off and led to its becoming a freshwater lake in about the 12th century, at the time when Stockholm was founded at its outlet."

Not only are the parts that were under glacial burden are rising but parts that were not under the ice are falling:

"Forbulge collapse is one of the larger causes of ground movement in the United States. Many places in the Eastern U.S. have been sinking for thousands of years and will continue to sink for thousands more. In fact, estimates say land around the Chesapeake Bay will sink as much as half a foot over the next 100 years because of the forebulge collapse."

So, the only sensible measures are places far removed from the glaciers.   This is why Sweden's increasing land area from 2018 to 2021 may not mean much.

Bangladesh is another matter.  It has never been glaciated and far enough way that forbulge is not an issue.  Yet it is not showing any significant change in area.

The Seychelles has not been glaciated since the continents reached their current locations.  Yet their surface area has not changed 1961-2022. 

More Deceptive Headlines

 4/22/25 Yahoo:

Coca-Cola under fire after bombshell report exposes ties to controversial industry: 'The cost is irreversible damage to our children's health'

Children's health?  I was assuming proof that sugar drinks are bad for you.  There is some evidence that sugary drinks increase cancer risk but even pure fruit juices apparently have that risk.

No.  

Euronews reported that Stand.earth found over 25 well-known consumer brands linked to fracking operations in the Permian Basin of Texas, one of the world's biggest "carbon bombs" because of its massive contribution to planet-warming pollution.

Fracking involves breaking apart shale rock below the earth's surface to extract natural gas and oil, which is achieved by using a high-pressure mix of water, sand, and chemicals blasted at the rock.

A byproduct is ethane, which is used to fuel the plastic industry. The Stand.earth investigation uncovered that much of the ethane from Texas is shipped overseas for plastic production.

Stand.earth observed that some of the brands linked to Permian Basin fracking include Coca-Cola, Unilever, Nestlé, and Procter & Gamble. P&G is the parent company of countless household brands, such as Gillette, Olay, and Always.

 Mother Earth has a fever!  Our children will all die!

 

 

NOAA Admits They Are Adjusting Historical Temperatures Data

2/25/25 ABC News admits that the temperature data from the Historicsl Climate Network gets changed in the past but with good ressons; today's instruments are different,  urban heat islands make cities hotter than their 20th century versions.  But it is all done very carefully and scientifically so there is no manipulation.  "Trust us! We're from the Government!"

Ancient Ice

The headline on this 2/25/25 Business Insider article refers to these artifacts as coming from melting glaciers.   The article more accurately describes these as ice patches.  The difference is that glaciers crush down under pressure and little survives undamaged.  Ice fields (or ice patches, as the body of the article labels them) are not mobile; they are very, very old patches of snow and ice still on the surface:

"Norway is at the forefront of this emerging field of research, called glacial archaeology. With about 4,500 artifacts discovered, the country claims more than half of the planet's glacial archaeology findings, according to Espen Finstad, who co-leads the Norwegian program, called Secrets of the Ice.

"Archaeologists there are piecing together clues about ancient industries and trade routes across the glaciers."

While the article had the obligatory reference to global warming,  the bigger question is why were humans up in these frozen areas thousands of years ago?  The answer should be obvious: these areas are just now returning to temperatures that they were at in earlier eras.  We are returning to temperatures that have been typical in the past. 

The Ice is Melting!

1/19/25 MSN reports on how rising temperatures are melting an ice field in the Rockies that is Exposing an as ancient forest:

Melting alpine ice in the Rocky Mountains has led to the discovery of a 5,900-year-old whitebark pine forest.

Over 30 trees are estimated to have been found by scientists during an archaeological survey on the Beartooth plateau in Wyoming.

The newly uncovered trees are located at 3,100 metres sea level which is 180 metres higher than the present tree line.

But what does this recent find mean for researchers?

According to Cathy Whitlock at Montana State University, it "offers us a window into past conditions at high elevations since you won't see Whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis) growing at this elevation today - that's because the climate was warmer back when these trees grew".

It is thought the trees lived 5950 to 5440 years ago when temperatures were gradually decreasing and to establish this timeline of the forest's history and age, the team analysed their rings and used carbon dating.

We are just now returning to temperatures of 4000 BC.  Obviously, this is because SUVs and jets are a problem.

Climate Change

"Sun stones and the darkened sun: Neolithic miniature art from the island of Bornholm, Denmark" Antiquity 1/16/25

This article looks at the discovery of a large number of ca. 3900 BC stones with Sun representations and ties their sudden appearance and then disappeared from the record to a 3900 BC volcanic eruption that causes dramatic cooling.  No Sun  requires actions to bring it back.

Climate Change and History

06/22/20 PNAS:

"Extreme climate after massive eruption of Alaska’s Okmok volcano in 43 BCE and effects on the late Roman Republic and Ptolemaic Kingdom"