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• Saturday, June 21, 2008 02:48 PM

  Warming = More Harmful Climate Extremes

  maureenodonnell: "It's dark here now and the rain is pouring down, even though it's the summer solstice. Those with a spirit of equanimity just shrug and say "It's good for the grass". Others more easily exasperated, such as myself, are wondering about all this talk of climate change."

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  Federal Report: Warming = More Harmful Climate Extremes

  By Andrew C. Revkin, New York Times

  June 19, 2008, 2:27 pm

  The first thorough federal review of research on how global warming may affect extreme climate events in North America forecasts more drenching rains, parching droughts (especially in the Southwest), intense heat waves and stronger hurricanes if long-lived greenhouse gases continue building in the atmosphere...

  The report, Weather and Climate Extremes in a Changing Climate, is online at climatescience.gov. The biggest impacts of global warming will be from the shifts in the frequency and duration of extreme events, not the slow rise in the average temperature, it concluded.

  Plenty of changes driven partly by the growing human climate influence are already apparent, the report said:

  For example, in recent decades most of North America has been experiencing more unusually hot days and nights, fewer unusually cold days and nights, and fewer frost days. Heavy downpours have become more frequent and intense.

  http://tinyurl.com/4gf9t3

  —Publicola Read Publicola's other letters
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