Terra Daily: Summer thunderstorms become much more fierce when they collide with a city than they would otherwise be in the open countryside, according to research led by Princeton engineers. Alexandros A. Ntelekos and James A. Smith of Princeton University's School of Engineering and Applied Science based their conclusion on computer models and detailed observations of an extreme thunderstorm that hit Baltimore in July of 2004.
Their modeling suggests that the city of Baltimore experienced about 30 percent more rainfall than the region it occupies would have experienced had there been no buildings where the city now sits. While thunderstorms are thought of as being purely forces of nature, the Princeton research suggests that man's built environment can radically alter a storm's life cycle.
A storm of the intensity of the 2004 event in Baltimore is extremely rare, occurring only once every 200 years or so. However, climate change is expected to make such events more frequent, according to the fourth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
"Precipitation events like gully-washing rainstorms are expected to increase in intensity as the world warms due to the buildup of greenhouse gases," said Michael Oppenheimer, a lead author on the IPCC report and the Albert G. Milbank Professor of Geosciences and International Affairs at Princeton. "This is just the sort of research that combines science, engineering, and social response that may allow us to better cope with the future, warmer climate. I hope it will also serve as a warning about the complexity of adaptation, and therefore, as a goad to policymakers to act more urgently to stabilize the climate."…
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