The tropical cyclones Seroja and Odette came together in the Indian Ocean north-west of Australia in April 2021. After the two cyclones merged, TC Seroja abruptly changed course by 90 degrees. Credit: Provided by the Japanese Space Agency (JAXA), JAXA P-Tree System
In April 2021, tropical cyclones Seroja and Odette clashed in the southeastern Indian Ocean, just north-west of Australia, before finally merging completely.
The Australian Bureau of Meteorology describes this interaction as rare: “Seroja produc[ed] torrential rainfall and devastating floods in parts of Indonesia and Timor Leste. Later, it interacted with Tropical Cyclone Odette via the Fujiwara effect, a phenomenon rarely observed in the Australian region. Finally, it strengthened into a category 3 tropical cyclone producing a severe impact in the Mid-West region of Western Australia, unusually far south for a coastal crossing of a Severe Tropical Cyclone.”
These types of convergences are one of the most extreme interactions between the ocean and the atmosphere on Earth. But with the number and intensity of tropical cyclones increasing because of global warming, understanding their impacts has become more important than ever.
“Seroja first of all stalled the smaller cyclone Odette and then merged with it 3 days later,” says Oliver Wurl of the University of Oldenburg in Germany. After the cyclones merged, Seroja abruptly changed course by 90 degrees.
The whole encounter lasted for about a week.
“This chain of events not only influenced weather patterns but also triggered a previously unobserved interaction with the ocean underneath,” says Wurl.
In a new report in in the journal Tellus A: Dynamic Meteorology and Oceanography, Wurl and colleague Jens Meyerjürgens analysed the encounter between the 2 relatively weak tropical cyclones and found effects that have only been observed with much stronger systems.
They did this by combining satellite data, measurements of the upper ocean, such as salinity and water temperatures obtained from ARGO floats and autonomous drifters, and numerical modelling.
The researchers found that sea-surface temperatures dropped by 3°C in the aftermath of the merge due to cold water upwelling towards the sea surface from depths of 200m.
Given cyclones’ intensity as a Category 1 on the Hurricane Scale, this cooling effect and depth of upwelling was “exceptionally high” – on the scale observed in Category 4 or 5 hurricanes.
“As a result of the interactions of a cyclone with the ocean and the upwelling of cold, deep water, the ocean absorbs additional heat from the air and then transports it to higher latitudes – a crucial process that influences the climate worldwide,” explains Wurl.
The researchers conclude that the simultaneous formation and interaction between tropical cyclones could increase in the future with global warming and, with it, the extreme thermodynamic responses of the upper ocean.
The Ultramarine project – focussing on research and innovation in our marine environments – is supported by Minderoo Foundation.
Not taking this personally, but: I do not read every link in every post every time. I do read at least one link from each post with a link, as soon as I get there. I admire that you can do that! And if you’re ready to quit, I don’t blame you. Do as you will, but you are not unappreciated, FWIW. 🖖 ☮ 🌞 I hope we still get to see ya around!
The presidential election has turned into a contest between a capable, smart woman who emphasizes what Americans can achieve when they work together for the common good, and a sundowning old racist creep who would be pathetic if he weren’t so dangerously close to returning to power.
In case you’re wondering what the difference looks like, compare the hate and division the old racist creep is spreading with some recent announcements from President Joe Biden’s administration, nearly all of them about programs funded by one or another of Biden’s big legislative packages. Just a little reminder of why elections matter, and of the legacy that Kamala Harris is committed to building on. For, y’know, the people.
US researchers have developed a chalk-based coating that can reduce the temperature under fabric by roughly 5°C.
The researchers say their environmentally benign substance could be used to coat any type of fabric and turn it into a radiative cooling textile.
“We see a true cooling effect,” says Evan Patamia, a graduate student at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
“What is underneath the sample feels colder than standing in the shade.”
Patamia presented the team’s invention at the American Chemical Society’s 2024 Fall Meeting earlier this week.
Substances that can both reflect sunlight, and allow body heat to escape, are well-known to chemists. But they generally require costly or environmentally dangerous materials to make.
“Can we develop a textile coating that does the same thing using natural or environmentally benign materials?” summarises chemist Trisha Andrew, also at Amherst, of the work done by her and her colleagues.
Inspired by crushed limestone, which is used to cool buildings, the researchers tried solutions of calcium carbonate – the main component in limestone and chalk – as well as barium sulphate.
They used squares of fabric treated with a process called chemical vapour deposition, which added a layer of a carbon-based polymer onto the textiles.
When dipped in the solutions, the fabrics built up a chalky matte layer of crystals which could reflect UV and infrared light.
They tested the treated fabrics outside on a warm afternoon, and air underneath them was about 5°C cooler than the ambient temperature, and roughly 9°C cooler than air under untreated fabrics.
The coating is also resistant to laundry detergents.
“What makes our technique unique is that we can do this on nearly any commercially available fabric and turn it into something that can keep people cool,” says Patamia.
“Without any power input, we’re able to reduce how hot a person feels, which could be a valuable resource where people are struggling to stay cool in extremely hot environments.”
Andrew is now part of a startup aiming to test the process on larger bolts of fabric, to see if it can be scaled to industry.
Scientists have compiled a library of hailstones to help fine-tune hailstorm simulations and make weather forecasts more accurate.
To make calculations more simple, conventional scientific hailstorm modelling assumes all hailstones are perfectly spherical. In reality, they’re a little more complicated than that.
A hailstone, flecked with black paint to assist in 3-D scanning, is weighed as part of processing for the hail library. Credit: UQ
“Hail can be all sorts of weird shapes, from oblong to a flat disc or have spikes coming out – no two pieces of hail are the same,” says Dr Joshua Soderholm, honorary senior research fellow at University of Queensland and research scientist at the Bureau of Meteorology in Australia.
In their new study in the Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, Soderholm and collaborators explored whether compiling a reference library of non-spherical, natural hail shapes could change the outcomes of hailstorm modelling.
“Our study used data from 217 hail samples, which were 3-D scanned and then sliced in half, to tell us more about how the hailstone formed,” says Soderholm.
“This is effectively a dataset to represent the many and varied shapes of hailstones.”
According to lead researcher Yuzhu Lin, a PhD candidate at Pennsylvania State University in the US, the differences were dramatic.
“Modelling of the more naturally shaped hail showed it took different pathways through the storm, experienced different growth and landed in different places,” she says.
Dr Joshua Soderholm photographing a hailstone. Credit: UQ
“It also affected the speed and impact the hail had on the ground. This way of modelling had never been done before, so it’s exciting science.”
While the modelling is currently only used by scientists studying storms, Soderholm says the end game is to be able to predict how big hail will be and where it will fall in real-time.
“More accurate forecasts would of course warn the public so they can stay safe during hailstorms and mitigate damage,” he says.
“But it could also significantly benefit industries such as insurance, agriculture and solar farming which are all sensitive to hail.”
“Phosphorus is a common component in the cathodes of lithium-ion batteries – specifically, lithium iron phosphate batteries, which represent about 60% of the lithium-ion market according to the researchers.
“As an important ingredient in fertilisers and industrial chemicals, mineral phosphorus is in high demand. Mining stocks of phosphorus are expected to be depleted in the next 50-100 years.
“But, point out the researchers, more than 250,000 tonnes of phosphorus pollutes Chinese wastewater every year, coming from food consumption and chemical waste. This is more phosphorus than the amount consumed each year to make batteries.” (snip)
“The researchers used their wastewater-derived mixture to build small lithium-ion batteries in the lab. These batteries could charge and discharge at the rates needed for electric vehicles and large-scale storage systems, and they kept 99.2% of their capacity after being charged and discharged 100 times.
“Batteries made with higher doses of the wastewater material performed better than batteries made with lower doses. The researchers believe that impurities from the sludge helped to stabilise the batteries, allowing them to perform better.
“’The amount of phosphorus recovered from municipal wastewater is projected to be sufficient to meet up to 35% of the phosphorus demand by the lithium-ion battery industry in China, enhancing the cost-effectiveness of phosphorus recovery and alleviating the global shortage of phosphorus resources to achieve both clean energy and sustainable development,’ conclude the researchers in their paper.”
“In the last few years, Australia has faced both flooding rains and some of the lowest rainfall on record. Now, researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences have the data that explains why rain in Australia has seemed so unpredictable.
“The researchers have shown that human-induced climate warming is driving increases in rainfall variability over 75% of the Earth’s land, and they say the effects are especially prominent in Australia.
“The study looked at increases in rainfall variability, which can mean wetter wet periods and drier dry periods. They found that daily variability has increased by 1.2% per decade globally, and that humans are largely to blame.
“’The increase in rainfall variability is mainly due to anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, which have led to a warmer and more humid atmosphere,’ said Dr Zhang Wenxia, lead author of the study.
“’This means that even if the atmospheric circulation remains the same, the additional moisture in the air leads to more intense rain events and more drastic fluctuations between them.’
“Professor Steven Sherwood at the UNSW Climate Change Research Centre, who was not involved in the study, told the AusSMC that this means rainier rainy periods and drier dry periods.
“’This is going to increase as global warming continues, enhancing the chances of droughts and/or floods.’
“The paper identified Australia as being a particular hotspot for rainfall variability. Dr Milton Speer from the University of Technology Sydney said the paper’s findings are significant, and that other recent studies have had similar conclusions.” (snip-More)
Rising temperatures mean dehydrated, exhausted kids, and teachers who have to focus on heat safety instead of instruction.
Originally published by The 19th (Republished with their republish link)
Angela Girol has been teaching fourth grade in Pittsburgh for over two decades. Over the years she’s noticed a change at her school: It’s getting hotter.
Some days temperatures reach 90 degrees Fahrenheit in her classroom which, like many on the East Coast, isn’t air-conditioned. When it’s hot, she said, kids don’t eat, or drink enough water. “They end up in the nurse’s office because they’re dizzy, they have a headache, their stomach hurts — all because of heat and dehydration,” she said.
To cope with the heat, her students are now allowed to keep water on their desks, but that presents its own challenges. “They’re constantly filling up water bottles, so I have to give them breaks during the day for that. And then everyone has to go to the bathroom all the time,” she said. “I’m losing instruction time.”
The effect extreme heat is having on schools and child care is starting to get the attention of policymakers and researchers. Last week, the Center for American Progress, a left-leaning think tank, published a report on the issue. In April, so did the Federation of American Scientists, a nonprofit policy organization.
“The average school building in the U.S. was built nearly 50 years ago,” said policy analyst Allie Schneider, co-author of the Center for American Progress report. “Schools and child care centers were built in areas that maybe 30 or 15 years ago didn’t require access to air-conditioning, or at least for a good portion of the year. Now we’re seeing that becoming a more pressing concern.” Students are also on campus during the hottest parts of the day. “It’s something that is really important not just to their physical health, but their learning outcomes,” she said.
Last April, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released its own report detailing some of the effects heat has on kids. It notes that children have a harder time thermo-regulating and take longer to produce sweat, making them more vulnerable than adults to heat exhaustion and heat illness.
Kids don’t necessarily listen to their body’s cues about heat, and might need an adult to remind them to drink water or not play outside. Kevin Toolan, a sixth-grade teacher in Long Island, New York, said having to constantly monitor heat safety distracts him from being able to teach. “The mindset is shifting to safety rather than instruction,” he said. “Those children don’t know how to handle it.”
To keep the classroom cool, he’ll turn the lights off, but kids fall asleep. “They are lethargic,” he said.
To protect kids, schools have canceled classes because temperatures have gotten too high. Warmer temperatures also lead to more kids being absent from school, especially low-income students. And heat makes it harder to learn. One study from 2020 tracked the scores of students from schools without air-conditioning who took the PSAT exam at least twice. It found that increases in the average outdoor temperature corresponded with students making smaller gains on their retakes.
Both Toolan and Girol said that cooling options like keeping doors and windows open to promote cross ventilation are gone, thanks to the clampdowns in school security after 9/11 — and worsened by the threat of school shootings. Students and teachers are trapped in their overheating classrooms. “Teachers report leaving with migraines or signs of heat exhaustion,” said Toolan. “At 100 degrees, it is very uncomfortable. Your clothes are stuck to you.”
The Center for American Progress report joins a call by other advocacy groups to create federal guidance that schools and child care centers could adopt “to ensure that children are not forced to learn, play and exercise in dangerously hot conditions,” Schneider said. Some states already have standards in place, but they vary. In California, child care facilities are required to keep temperatures between 68 and 85 degrees. In Maryland, the recommendation is between 74 and 82 degrees. A few states, like Florida, require schools to reduce outdoor activity on high-heat days. Schneider says federal guidance would help all school districts use the latest scientific evidence to set protective standards.
In June, 23 health and education advocacy organizations signed a letter making a similar request of the Department of Education, asking for better guidance and coordination to protect kids. Some of their recommendations included publishing a plan that schools could adopt for dealing with high temperatures; encouraging states to direct more resources to providing air-conditioning in schools; and providing school districts with information on heat hazards.
“We know that school infrastructure is being overwhelmed by extreme heat, and that without a better system to advise schools on the types of practices they should be implementing, it’s going to be a little bit of the Wild West of actions being taken,” said Grace Wickerson, health equity policy manager at the Federation of American Scientists.
A longer term solution is upgrading school infrastructure but the need for air conditioning is overwhelming. According to the Center for American Progress report, 36,000 schools nationwide don’t have adequate HVAC systems. By 2025, it estimates that installing or upgrading HVAC or other cooling systems will cost around $4.4 billion.
Some state or local governments are trying to address the heat issue. In June, the New York State Legislature passed a bill now awaiting the governor’s signature that would require school staff to take measures like closing blinds or turning off lights when temperatures reach 82 degrees inside a classroom. At 88 degrees, classes would be canceled. A bill introduced last year and currently before California’s state assembly would require schools to create extreme heat action plans that could include mandating hydration and rest breaks or moving recess to cooler parts of the day.
Some teachers have been galvanized to take action, too. As president of the Patchogue-Medford Congress of Teachers, Toolan was part of an effort to secure $80 million for infrastructure upgrades through a bond vote. Over half will go to HVAC systems for some 500 schools in his district.
And Girol is running for a state representative seat in Pennsylvania, where a main plank in her platform is to fully fund public schools in order to pay for things like air-conditioning. She was recently endorsed by the Climate Cabinet, a federal political action committee. “Part of the reason climate is so important to me is because of this issue,” she said. “I see how it’s negatively affecting my students.”
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