As the Northeast begins the slow process of cleaning up after Superstorm Sandy, one expert believes there is a way to lessen the power of hurricanes.<\/p>\n
The impact of Superstorm Sandy will be felt for a long time for those living in storm-ravaged areas.\u00a0 With the death toll continuing to climb and damage estimates spiraling towards $50 billion dollars<\/a>, Sandy impacted areas as far west as Wisconsin and south as the Carolinas.<\/p>\n Although a Category 1 hurricane, Superstorm Sandy\u2019s record low pressure of 940 mb recorded on Monday afternoon was the lowest reading ever recorded for an Atlantic storm making landfall north of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, and was equivalent to a Category 4 hurricane.\u00a0 Was Superstorm Sandy \u201ca sign of things to come,\u201d as climate scientist Michael Oppenheimer <\/a>of Princeton University suggests and, if so, can anything be done to lessen or stop these storms?<\/p>\n Once a hurricane forms, there\u2019s no way of stopping it.\u00a0 Hurricanes are enormous, covering tens of thousands of square miles in size.\u00a0 Superstorm Sandy, for example, was twice the size of Texas.\u00a0 The energy contained within hurricanes is more powerful than our most powerful nuclear weapons.\u00a0 As their winds increase, so does their power.<\/p>\n Hurricanes gather heat and energy through contact with warm ocean waters, and evaporation from seawater increases their strength.\u00a0 If there was a way to remove some of the energy that hurricanes feed off of, however, there might be a way to lessen their strength or even prevent them from occurring.<\/p>\n Dr. John Latham<\/a>, a Senior Visiting Scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, has been studying this phenomenon.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you go from 50 miles an hour to 100 miles an hour you get a four-fold increase in catastrophic energy,\u201d Latham says.<\/p>\n Latham has been looking at ways to \u201cknock the wind out of a hurricane,\u201d and one of his ideas was something he came up with decades ago.\u00a0 He believes that if ocean waters could be cooled, there might be a chance of lessening the strength of any storm that forms.\u00a0 \u201cLessen the winds and you lessen the power of the storm.\u201d<\/p>\n Latham\u2019s idea involves seeding clouds with tiny particles of sea water, which would cause the clouds to reflect more sunlight back into space, resulting in less heating of the ocean\u2019s surface. \u00a0The end result would be cooler ocean waters and less energy for hurricane development.\u00a0 Latham suggests possibly using remote-controlled or wind-powered ships to do the work, sending misted seawater into clouds.<\/p>\n According to Latham, even a small reduction in temperature could result in a huge difference in a hurricane\u2019s strength.\u00a0 Researchers at the University of Leeds agree, and their calculations<\/a> suggest that even just a few degrees difference could reduce a hurricane\u2019s power by one category.<\/p>\n There are concerns, however, and Latham and other researchers worry about the consequences of weather manipulation.\u00a0 “Much more research is needed and we are clear that cloud seeding should not be deployed until we are sure there will be no adverse consequences regarding rainfall,” says Dr. Alan Gadian of the University of Leeds. \u00a0“However, if our calculations are correct, judicious seeding of maritime clouds could be invaluable for significantly reducing the destructive power of hurricanes.\u201d<\/p>\n Another drawback is cost, as field-testing could run into the tens of millions of dollars. \u00a0Compared to the billions Superstorm Sandy will cost, however, that amount seems small.\u00a0 And if Sandy was an omen of storms to come, then \u201cThe costs of the damage let alone the human life are really so much greater than the cost of the field experiment to test the idea out,\u201d says Latham.<\/p>\n Unfortunately, the biggest drawback is continued weather modification, which has been ongoing for decades.\u00a0 As the knowledge of understanding climatic processes increases, so too do the possibilities for misuse, but perhaps we\u2019re already seeing the results.<\/p>\n