| Topic: |
Science > Physics |
| User: |
"habshi" |
| Date: |
03 Sep 2005 05:49:14 AM |
| Object: |
How to stop hurricanes |
As in forest fires we could cut down an area in its path. So
how about 100s of Otec pumping stations to cool the water around
Florida?
To stop so much destruction we need to dig artificial lakes
around cities to store the flood waters . A mile deep one mile square
lake would have been enough to protect New Orleans and most of
Louisiana.
A million tents should be kept ready with water bottles and
canned foods so that nobody starves.
.
|
|
| User: "habshi" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
04 Sep 2005 10:50:14 AM |
|
|
According to newspapers here the power of the Katrina was
equivalent to 10,000 nuclear weapons .
.
|
|
|
| User: "John Schutkeker" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
07 Sep 2005 07:38:25 AM |
|
|
(habshi) wrote in news:431b1772.26010000@news.clara.net:
According to newspapers here the power of the Katrina was
equivalent to 10,000 nuclear weapons .
How about the power in only the localized area northeast of the eye, which
is the part that does all the damage?
.
|
|
|
|
| User: "" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
04 Sep 2005 12:09:24 PM |
|
|
habshi wrote:
According to newspapers here the power of the Katrina was
equivalent to 10,000 nuclear weapons .
10,000 100 megaton nuclear weapons or 10,000 smaller nuclear weapons?
.
|
|
|
|
|
| User: "habshi" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 01:27:45 PM |
|
|
All you need to do is lower the surface temp of the water
from 32 to 30 C and OTEC can do that and provide us with huge
amounts of energy .How many OTECs can be built with $26b?
Had they dedged the lake another 100ft New Orleans would have
been saved.
.
|
|
|
| User: "" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 03:19:36 PM |
|
|
In sci.physics habshi <habshi@anony.com> wrote:
All you need to do is lower the surface temp of the water
from 32 to 30 C and OTEC can do that and provide us with huge
amounts of energy .How many OTECs can be built with $26b?
Idiot.
Had they dedged the lake another 100ft New Orleans would have
been saved.
The level of the lake is higher than New Oleans.
The water table in most of that area is a few feet down.
Digging a deep hole just means you have a deep lake.
You are still an idiot.
--
Jim Pennino
Remove .spam.sux to reply.
.
|
|
|
| User: "habshi" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 07:14:42 PM |
|
|
If the figures are true and the energy of the hurricane was
truly five times worldwide energy use , then its a sign of hope. We
can increase our energy use ten times and still not have global
warming , and still make everyone a millionaire.
Carbon can easily be taken out of the atmosphere by dumping
iron in the mid oceans and letting plankton bloom
Btw reports say more storms are brewing in the Atlantic and
heading towards the usa.
.
|
|
|
| User: "" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 07:28:44 PM |
|
|
In sci.physics habshi <habshi@anony.com> wrote:
If the figures are true and the energy of the hurricane was
truly five times worldwide energy use , then its a sign of hope. We
can increase our energy use ten times and still not have global
warming , and still make everyone a millionaire.
Carbon can easily be taken out of the atmosphere by dumping
iron in the mid oceans and letting plankton bloom
Btw reports say more storms are brewing in the Atlantic and
heading towards the usa.
You are such an imbecile.
Does someone help you find the keyboard while you make noises similar
to a cat hacking up a hairball?
--
Jim Pennino
Remove .spam.sux to reply.
.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| User: "habshi" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
04 Sep 2005 05:09:50 AM |
|
|
There is dry ground just five miles from the city center.
0.1m tents could have been set up to provide people with food
shelter chemical toilets etc ,and they could have stayed there for
months until their homes are rebuilit or NO relocated as Houston was
after the last hurricane there in the 1800s
excerpt
A nation tries to absorb exodus of the 400,000
Sarah Baxter
The evacuation
THE city of New Orleans has emptied out more than 400,000 of its
inhabitants into neighbouring states, cities, towns, villages and
private homes, which are scrambling to offer assistance.
In the confusion and panic of the exodus, many separated families did
not know whether loved ones were alive or dead, nor where they were.
There were heartbreaking scenes at one New Orleans hospital, where
frantic new mothers begged rescuers to take their children to safety.
“These mothers were just giving my medics their little day-old
babies,” said Richard Zuschlag, head of the local ambulance service.
“They were looking at us with fear and horror on their faces. We would
put four of them in an incubator and just fly them out.
.....
excerpt sundaytimes
There are two types of biofuel: biodiesel made from plant oils and
bioethanol made by fermenting grains. These can be used in unmodified
diesel and petrol engines respectively when blended with conventional
diesel and petrol. The vast majority of biofuels on sale in Britain
actually include no more than 5% biodiesel or bioethanol to 95%
conventional fuel, in compliance with British and European Union
approved standards.
Most manufacturers argue higher concentrations would damage
conventional engines, although critics point out that they are used
elsewhere — in the United States, for example, where blends are
usually 10% bioethanol. With minor modification engines can be
converted to run on even higher concentrations of biofuel and a
handful of independent garages currently sell 100% biodiesel — about
nine around the UK, according to www.biodieselfillingstations.co.uk —
and claim most diesel cars can run on it without alteration. The price
per litre is about 89p: comparable with the price of conventional
diesel.
Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions are about the same (comparing biodiesel
with diesel and bioethanol with petrol) but the equivalent amount of
CO2 released when the fuel is burnt will be reabsorbed through
photosynthesis by the next crop of plants, so the CO2 is effectively
recycled. Engines that run on biodiesel also produce lower particulate
pollution and nitrogen oxide emissions.
“For the next 50 years at least, biofuels are likely to be the most
effective alternative to fossil fuels,” says Peter Clery, chairman of
Babfo.
It is not just lobby groups that say so. Last month the EU increased
pressure on the British government to meet its biofuel targets. The EU
would like 2% of all fuel sold within its borders to be biofuel by
next year and just under 6% by 2010. Unlike Germany and France, which
are on course to hit the 2% target, Britain currently plans to achieve
just 0.3% by the end of the year.
The government is expected to announce a more ambitious 2010 target
before the new year and is considering placing a legal requirement on
oil companies to produce a certain quantity of biofuel.
Critics claim that because conventional fuels are needed in the
production and refining process, the ultimate benefit of biofuels to
the environment is not clear-cut. Even their supporters acknowledge
the problem but say biofuels can still cut CO2 emissions realistically
by between 50-60%.
On the ground the change in thinking on biofuels is evident. The
number of hectares of oilseed rape leapt by 100,000 to just under 1.5m
between 2004 and 2005, according to Babfo. It predicts a similar
increase next year as farmers switch from putting food in our stomachs
to juice in our tanks.
British sales of biodiesel, although still a fraction of traditional
fuels, more than doubled between April 2004 and May 2005 — up from
less than 1.5m litres per month to almost 3m litres, according to
Department for Transport figures. Sales of bioethanol reached 7.8m
litres in the same month, up from virtually nothing and boosted by the
introduction of a 20p tax rebate (biodiesel has had one since 2002) at
the beginning of the year.
The number of garage forecourts stocking the fuel is also rising.
Tesco is leading the way among petrol retailers — of its 381 fuel
stations, more than half have replaced conventional unleaded petrol
with petrol that includes 5% bioethanol.
“We hope to have bioethanol included in all our unleaded petrol within
the next few years,” said a Tesco spokesman. “We can sell it for the
same price as conventional unleaded so there was no reason not to take
the green option.” Tesco also has 23 stations offering a 5% biodiesel
blend.
Car makers too are being converted. Earlier this summer Saab launched
its first flexible-fuel model, a version of the Saab 9-5 that can
handle bioethanol concentrations of up to 85% as well as pure petrol.
The car is currently only on sale in Sweden but Saab hopes to take
British orders early next year. A flexible-fuel version of the Ford
Focus will be available next April.
Right now the dream of a clean biofuel future remains just that. But
as the momentum of government, petrol companies and motorists builds
behind it, Clery’s vision appears increasingly plausible. “Every field
in Britain could become a potential oilfield,” he says.
.
|
|
|
|
| User: "Bob Eldred" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 11:33:59 PM |
|
|
"habshi" <habshi@anony.com> wrote in message
news:43197e72.3260918@news.clara.net...
As in forest fires we could cut down an area in its path. So
how about 100s of Otec pumping stations to cool the water around
Florida?
To stop so much destruction we need to dig artificial lakes
around cities to store the flood waters . A mile deep one mile square
lake would have been enough to protect New Orleans and most of
Louisiana.
A million tents should be kept ready with water bottles and
canned foods so that nobody starves.
The US messed around with weather modification in the 1940's and 50's. They
did cloud seeding and all kinds of other experiments with a major goal of
reducing the severity of tropical storms and tornados. I don't know how
successful they were. However, as I understand it, they got a lot of flack
and complaints from other countries, noteably Mexico, for potentially
disturbing natural weather patterns. Mexico relys on tropical weather to
water crops in its central and southern regions. They were concerned that
any weather modification could expand the deserts southward and affect their
agriculture. The US stopped the program.
While your ideas are a bit far out any significant change in the heat
balance of the gulf of Mexico could affect everybodies weather and could
seriously expand the deserts into the mid west. Hurricanes are a part of
nature and by now we should have learned to live with them.
New Orleans was unprepared yet they have been warned about these storms for
hundreds of years. In 1718 when the city was founded, the surveying engineer
warned not to put a village at that location between a large lake and the
mississippi river. They did it anyway. The levees have been built over the
years and they still have flooded from time to time, like 1927. They keep
increasing the levees but the city keeps sinking because of the lack of
silting that use to occur in the marshlands.
The city and state should have had an evacuation plan ready in case this
kind of disaster occured. It's not like they weren't warned. The federal
government failed because FEMA and Homeland Security are a joke run by
incompetent hacks. There was no plan for a major disaster in a US city even
though they practiced this very scenario last summer. That's how incompetent
they are. Remember, the Feds screwed up Baghdad too and were not prepared
for the looting and civil unrest that occured when Iraq fell. They talk the
talk but don't walk the walk. We are obviously not prepared for a major
terrorist attack either despite the BS you hear.
Bob
.
|
|
|
|
| User: "John Schutkeker" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
07 Sep 2005 08:17:44 AM |
|
|
(habshi) wrote in news:43197e72.3260918@news.clara.net:
As in forest fires we could cut down an area in its path. So
how about 100s of Otec pumping stations to cool the water around
Florida?
Sounds like an interesting project for theoretical research. You should
crunch the numbers, write up a report and submit it to NASA, NSF or NOAA.
.
|
|
|
|
| User: "" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 10:47:59 AM |
|
|
In sci.physics habshi <habshi@anony.com> wrote:
As in forest fires we could cut down an area in its path. So
how about 100s of Otec pumping stations to cool the water around
Florida?
How about it?
This is just so insanely stupid it isn't worth further comment.
To stop so much destruction we need to dig artificial lakes
around cities to store the flood waters . A mile deep one mile square
lake would have been enough to protect New Orleans and most of
Louisiana.
New Orleans was flooded by the adjacent lake spilling through the
dirt levees.
If they had build the levees out of concrete instead of dirt, New
Orleans wouldn't have flooded.
A million tents should be kept ready with water bottles and
canned foods so that nobody starves.
Where do you pitch a tent in a flood area idiot?
You are still an imbecile.
--
Jim Pennino
Remove .spam.sux to reply.
.
|
|
|
| User: "Fritz Schlunder" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 02:24:16 PM |
|
|
<jimp@specsol.spam.sux.com> wrote in message
news:dfcgjf$f4r$1@mail.specsol.com...
In sci.physics habshi <habshi@anony.com> wrote:
As in forest fires we could cut down an area in its path. So
how about 100s of Otec pumping stations to cool the water around
Florida?
OTEC systems are thermal engines, so they are restricted to less than Carnot
efficiencies. Given the extremely low temperature difference between T(hot)
and T(cold), the thermodynamic efficiency is extremely low. Very little
thermal energy is actually removed from the water (in the form of
electricity), most of the hot surface water of a OTEC system simply gets
mixed with the relatively cold lower water.
Realistically the only thing likely to be accomplished by placing OTEC
systems in hurricane central would be that they would all be promptly
destroyed by a hurricane.
To stop so much destruction we need to dig artificial lakes
around cities to store the flood waters . A mile deep one mile square
lake would have been enough to protect New Orleans and most of
Louisiana.
New Orleans was flooded by the adjacent lake spilling through the
dirt levees.
If they had build the levees out of concrete instead of dirt, New
Orleans wouldn't have flooded.
Actually, that isn't quite right. Most of the water currently occupying
"Lake New Orleans" did come from lake Pontchartrain from the north, but it
didn't enter through damaged dirt levees. Most of the water came in through
the floodwall breaches on the 17th Street Canal and London Avenue Canal.
These aren't dirt levees, they are floodwalls built from steel and concrete.
As it so happens, floodwalls are more vulnerable than large tall wide dirt
levees.
See:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4826934&ft=1&f=1025
Lake New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin suggested the sandbags weren't dropped into
the breaches because the helicopters were diverted for resue efforts, but I
believe he was misinformed. There was conflicting media reports that
sealing the breaches was everyone's first priority (rescue operations
second), and that they did try dropping sand bags into the breach, but that
such efforts were futile. They said the sandbags simply "disappeared" into
the breach after dropping them in.
This is very believeable. Once a levee or floodwall becomes initially
breached, the water flowing past and around the area further stresses the
remaining and intact parts of the wall. Once the wall has a hole in it, it
makes the adjacent parts of the wall much weaker. Further compounding the
problem, the water will tend to erode and weaken the foundation of the
remaining walls. A net consequence of all of these factors is that any
breach in the system will typically expand rapidly to become giant gaping
holes in the system. Sealing a giant hole two city blocks wide with raging
waters flowing past just isn't realistic. Levee systems are notorious for
failing spectacularly at the most inopportune moments, and there is really
nothing that can be done about it until the water flow stops.
Building cities below sea level, while surrounded on practically all sides
by water, in the middle of hurricane central is just plain dumb. Even if
they rebuild their floodwalls and levees for "category five" strength, there
is no such thing as hurricane immunity. The best they can hope for is
hurricane resistance. Further troubling in this day and age of terrorism,
tens or hundreds of miles of levees and floodwalls can't realistically be
protected. They are vulnerable to sabotage, explosives, bulldozers on a
rampage, etc. The entire New Orleans area is also subsiding, simultaneous
with sea levels rising (global warming), simultaneous with natural erosion
to the wetlands to the south of New Orleans. The wetlands help to protect
New Orleans in the event of hurricanes, since the hurricanes will normally
weaken while passing over the wetlands. Additionally, the wetlands serve to
stop the oceanic storm surge from reaching New Orleans.
All things considered, if they simply rebuild it is pretty much guaranteed
history will repeat itself and New Orleans will become Lake New Orleans once
again. The only question is when. When it does happen, lives will be lost
(again), likely in the thousands or even tens of thousands, and immense
human suffering will occur (again).
If I were the governor of Louisiana (or the president of the US), I don't
think I could sleep at night knowing that if I allowed people to rebuild New
Orleans, that someday (who knows really when, but surely someday) this
nightmare would occur again, and thousands more people will needlessly
perish. Sometimes you just gotta put hubris aside and cooperate with mother
nature instead of trying to fight her. Now is an excellent opportunity to
rebuild on higher ground in a much less vulnerable location.
A million tents should be kept ready with water bottles and
canned foods so that nobody starves.
Where do you pitch a tent in a flood area idiot?
Maybe they are supposed to affix pontoons to the tents. I seem to recall
hearing something about "floating dormitories" in the media lately. I
wonder what they mean by that.
.
|
|
|
|
| User: "" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 11:19:33 AM |
|
|
Habshi:
This one just doesnt work. All youi have to do is put your foot in the
Gulf of Mexico in the summer and realize that this vast source of heat
cannot be overcome by any small lake you make.
Besides, the warm water is vital to the environment of Florida even
though it makes for strong hurricanes.
A Florida native
.
|
|
|
| User: "Hatunen" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 01:33:07 PM |
|
|
On 3 Sep 2005 09:19:33 -0700, wrote:
Habshi:
This one just doesnt work. All youi have to do is put your foot in the
Gulf of Mexico in the summer and realize that this vast source of heat
cannot be overcome by any small lake you make.
Besides, the warm water is vital to the environment of Florida even
though it makes for strong hurricanes.
Gulf warmth is also vital to the climates of places like Ireland
and England through the Gulf Stream.
************* DAVE HATUNEN (hatunen@cox.net) *************
* Tucson Arizona, out where the cacti grow *
* My typos & mispellings are intentional copyright traps *
.
|
|
|
|
|
|
| User: "habshi" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 01:32:05 PM |
|
|
Sounds far too high
On Fri, 02 Sep 2005 10:01:07 -0400, Front Office <YoMo@erols.com>
wrote:
I estimate - _guess_, actually - that a category
4/5 hurricane such as Katrina is somewhere between
50 terrawatts (i.e., 50-trillion watts) and 500 Tw.
For comparison, humanity's average energy use rate
is about 13 Tw (~3 Tw for the U.S. alone), with a
peak of about twice that.
(I also estimate that the instantaneous energy of a
hurricane, due to kinetic energy of the rotating air
mass plus gravitational potential energy of suspended
water and the latent heat of vapor, is on the order
of 10^18 joules [~500 megatons of TNT equivalent].)
Hurricanes are powered by sunlight - i.e., they are
solar-powered. (It's interesting to try to imagine
ways to nurture, sustain, and put in harness, a
permanent hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico. Doing
such a thing would require an engineering project
whose scale would far exceed that of Apollo or
Manhattan, but if electricity could be produced from
it, then it might be a useful project.)
What variables and assumptions should be taken into
account in calculating, or making a refined estimate
of, the power of a hurricane?
Open to suggestions . . .
........................
..On 3 Sep 2005 09:33:49 -0700, "Edward Green"
<spamspamspam3@netzero.com> wrote:
Alex Terrell wrote: <...>
Power = 1.25E11 Watts = 125 GW.
Tim Keating wrote: <...>
194,000 GigaWatts
Hmm. Over three order of magnitude! That is serious, even for the
back of an envelope. However, I can offhand see several factors which
would tend to reconcile these numbers.
First, we should agree whether we are calculating the total work done
by the storm, or the total energy flux. Since we are using the term
"power", and comparing the results to measures of the total useful
work consumed by the US over certain periods, I take it we want work.
As I may have already mentioned, Alex Terrel assumes all the capacity
of a storm to do work is stored up in it at one moment, like a
spinning
top, which runs down over a course of days. The storm is more like a
pumped lossy top, which in continually dissipating energy and being
spun up by the weather system.
Terrel uses a 10 day lifetime for the top to run down. Suppose we
instead assumed that the instantaneous stored kinetic energy of the
storm represented one day's work input on the top: this increases his
power estimate by a an order of magnitude.
Tim Keating on the other hand bases his figures on heat transfer out
of
the warm water. He is modeling the energy input to a heat engine, but
we know a heat engine is thermodynamically limited in efficiency, and
that practically the efficiency is always lower than the limit. Say
the actual overall efficiency of the process is 10%: applied to power,
this decreases his estimate by an order of magnitude.
Now we have:
Terrell (modified) ~ 1,250 GW
Keating (modified) ~ 19,000 GW
Well, still over an order of magnitude, but at least on the back of
the
same envelope. ;-)
If the storm dissipates its instantaneous stored kinetic energy more
than once a day on average, or if the overall thermodynamic efficiency
is even lower, we can get closer. We have neglected both the
potential
energy loss of falling rain, and sources of the potential to do work
other than temperature differences, which factors would tend to
increase the individual estimates, in that order.
.
|
|
|
| User: "Tim Keating" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 02:17:48 PM |
|
|
On Sat, 03 Sep 2005 18:32:05 GMT, (habshi) wrote:
Sounds far too high
On Fri, 02 Sep 2005 10:01:07 -0400, Front Office <YoMo@erols.com>
wrote:
I estimate - _guess_, actually - that a category
4/5 hurricane such as Katrina is somewhere between
50 terrawatts (i.e., 50-trillion watts) and 500 Tw.
of 10^18 joules [~500 megatons of TNT equivalent].)
not even close..
Hurricanes are powered by sunlight - i.e., they are
solar-powered. (It's interesting to try to imagine
Ahem.. that's acculumated solar energy...
otherwise they could sustain themselves nearly indefinitly..
(which they don't)
Open to suggestions . . .
.......................
.On 3 Sep 2005 09:33:49 -0700, "Edward Green"
<spamspamspam3@netzero.com> wrote:
Alex Terrell wrote: <...>
Power = 1.25E11 Watts = 125 GW.
Tim Keating wrote: <...>
194,000 GigaWatts
Hmm. Over three order of magnitude! That is serious, even for the
back of an envelope. However, I can offhand see several factors which
would tend to reconcile these numbers.
snip..
Tim Keating on the other hand bases his figures on heat transfer out
of
the warm water. He is modeling the energy input to a heat engine, but
we know a heat engine is thermodynamically limited in efficiency, and
that practically the efficiency is always lower than the limit. Say
the actual overall efficiency of the process is 10%: applied to power,
this decreases his estimate by an order of magnitude.
snip...
Reduction of applied power not based in science..
Where did the loss go to????
Large atmospheric systems (hurricanes??) have a natural tendency
to approach ideal carnot efficiencies.
http://www.journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=105137
"Two thermodynamic principles offer considerable insight into the
climatic and geological settings for life on other planets, namely (1)
that natural systems tend to actually achieve the ideal (‘Carnot’)
limit of conversion of heat into work and (2) if a fluid system such
as an atmosphere has sufficient degrees of freedom, it will choose the
degree of heat transport that maximizes the generation of work
(equivalently, that which offers maximum entropy production)".
.
|
|
|
|
|
| User: "habshi" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 07:27:09 PM |
|
|
excerpt globe and mail
It is just past 60 years since the atomic bomb dubbed Little Boy was
detonated over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. So devastating was the
explosion that it stands as the benchmark of humanity's horrific
potential for destruction.
The bomb left a 150-metre-wide crater below the point of detonation
and destroyed about 60,000 buildings over six square kilometres.
Eighty-five thousand lives were instantly obliterated; 55,000 others
were lost after months of suffering the effects of the atomic blast.
That explosion was the equivalent of 12.5 kilotons of TNT, enough to
fill 200 freight cars stretching down two kilometres of railway track.
However, in terms of the devastating power of hurricanes, Little Boy
was as nothing at all.
Of course, hurricanes don't pack all of their destructive force into a
bomb's narrow confines of space and time. They mete it out over an
area that is, typically, one million square kilometres -- the size of
Ontario or South Africa -- and over the course of days.
Still, the most intense activity is concentrated at the wall that
rings the eye of the hurricane, which can be 20 to 100 kilometres
across.
From above, torrential rains pelt down as much as 2.5 metres of water
in a single day. From below, a storm surge whipped by violent waves
can raise the height of bodies of water by as much as nine metres and
pull the sea inland by 16 kilometres. In between, winds tear at
everything in their path at speeds of up to 289 kilometres per hour.
Farther out from the eye, conditions are less intense, but violent
nonetheless and capable of enormous destruction even at the outer
fringes of a fierce storm.
Taken over the entire cloud shield of an "average" hurricane, the
energy released daily in the form of rain and wind is the equivalent
of about 13,000 megatons -- almost equal to the destructive potential
of all the weapons in the Cold War missile silos in the United States
and the former Soviet Union. That's a million Hiroshima bombs exploded
at a rate of more than 10 a second -- 20 Little Boys for each of the
50,000 (estimated) cities on the planet.
The source of all this energy is truly unremarkable and innocuous.
It's what causes water ring stains on the cherished coffee table:
evaporation.
Essentially, hurricanes are colossal heat engines that balance the
heat contained in the atmosphere with that in the ocean. They do this,
simply enough, by taking up energy in the form of water vapour from
tropical surface waters and making the air hotter and more humid.
If it seems an extraordinary thing that something as ordinary as the
evaporation of water could drive anything as powerful as hurricanes,
consider the amount of energy that is involved in the evaporation of
even small volumes of water.
To raise the temperature of a 1.5-litre bottle of water by just one
degree Celsius requires little enough -- the energy used by a 100-watt
bulb in just one minute will do it. This is so even when the rise in
temperature is from 99 degrees to the boiling point.
Advertisements
However, taking water at 100 degrees from liquid form to vapour takes
a lot more energy -- 6,000 times more. It takes so much more, in fact,
that the energy needed to evaporate 1.5 litres is as much as the
energy released by one kilogram of TNT.
The average rain cloud holds about 300,000 tons or the equivalent of
300 million litres of water. The amount of energy required to
evaporate all this water is equal to almost 200 kilotons of TNT, or 15
Hiroshima bombs.
The formation of a hurricane requires about 100 million tons of water
vapour (100 billion litres of liquid water) per hour. It takes the
equivalent of the energy released by 50 megatons of TNT to evaporate
that much water. That's per hour, mind you. In a day, trillions of
litres of water are taken up into the atmosphere as vapour, requiring
the equivalent of more than a thousand megatons of energy.
If what goes up must come down, then all the energy taken up through
the evaporation of water must come down again. And it does -- as the
violent winds and torrential rains that make hurricanes so massively
destructive.
In the course of a season, over the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian
Oceans, the destructive energy released by hurricanes is staggering.
On average, there are 45 hurricanes a year for a total of about 450
hurricane days. Together, they amount to the equivalent of almost five
million megatons of TNT. More than 3,000 times the Cold War nuclear
arsenal. Almost 400 million Hiroshima bombs. Annually.
But a hurricane's destructiveness is not about energy alone. In fact,
the most destructive hurricanes are not necessarily the most intense.
Of the five costliest hurricanes of all time in the Atlantic, only one
was classified as Category 5.
More important is where a hurricane makes landfall, that is, where the
eye of the hurricane crosses from water onto land. When this happens
in populated and developed areas, economic damage soars. Last year,
Hurricanes Charley, Ivan, Frances and Jeanne inflicted a collective
economic toll in excess of $40-billion (U.S.).
However, the deadliest of hurricanes have not struck the United
States. Of the 45 hurricanes that occur in the average year, only six
take place over the Atlantic. The majority strike the Indian and
Pacific Oceans.
The worst Atlantic death toll was the Great Hurricane of 1780, which
caused as many as 30,000 deaths in the Caribbean.
This figure is overwhelmed, all too often, by the number of deaths in
the Pacific and Indian Oceans. Over these bodies of water, hurricanes
(referred to as cyclones) that make landfall in highly populated areas
have caused hundreds of thousands of deaths. Most catastrophic of all
was a 1970 cyclone that killed 500,000 people in Bangladesh.
The present hurricane season has really only just begun. The most
intense part is still to come.
Siegfried Betterman, a freelance journalist and former professor of
mathematics at George Brown College in Toronto, is writing a book on
the extremes of magnitude entitled Taking Measure.
Costly and deadly
The five costliest hurricanes of the Atlantic Ocean (in 2004 U.S.
dollars):
1. Great Miami Hurricane (1926, Category 4),
$70-billion
2. Andrew (1992, Category 5),
$26.5-billion
3. Charley (2004, Category 4),
$15-billion
4. Ivan (2004, Category 3),
$14.2-billion
5. Frances (2004, Category 2),
$9-billion
Five deadliest hurricanes:
1. Bangladesh (1970),
500,000 deaths
2. China (1881), 300,000
3. Haiphong, Vietnam (1881), 300,000
4. Bengal, India (1737), 300,000
5. Bangladesh (1876), 250,000
Information for damage figures from the National Hurricane Center and
the Hurricane Research Division of Atlantic Oceanographic and
Meteorological Laboratory.
«
.
|
|
|
|
| User: "Uncle Al" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
04 Sep 2005 01:05:59 AM |
|
|
habshi wrote:
As in forest fires we could cut down an area in its path.
[snip]
Hey stooopid wog - the ocean is already flat. Hurricanes die when
they go over solid surface asperities that do not offer opportunities
to loft spray to prevent coherent formation of dissipative structures.
--
Uncle Al
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/
(Toxic URL! Unsafe for children and most mammals)
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/qz.pdf
.
|
|
|
| User: "Jan Panteltje" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
04 Sep 2005 05:57:45 AM |
|
|
On a sunny day (Sat, 03 Sep 2005 23:05:59 -0700) it happened Uncle Al
<UncleAl0@hate.spam.net> wrote in <431A8EC7.3114CED0@hate.spam.net>:
Hey stooopid wog - the ocean is already flat. Hurricanes die when
they go over solid surface asperities that do not offer opportunities
to loft spray to prevent coherent formation of dissipative structures.
mmm they have internet in the astro dome it seems :-)
.
|
|
|
|
|
| User: "" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 09:10:40 AM |
|
|
habshi wrote:
As in forest fires we could cut down an area in its path. So
how about 100s of Otec pumping stations to cool the water around
Florida?
To stop so much destruction we need to dig artificial lakes
around cities to store the flood waters . A mile deep one mile square
lake would have been enough to protect New Orleans and most of
Louisiana.
A million tents should be kept ready with water bottles and
canned foods so that nobody starves.
The helicopters and National Guradsmen needed to build leeves to save
New Orleans were in Iraq. New Orleans had massive pumping stations
that could have kept the city dry had enough helicopters been available
to supply the sandbags needed.
.
|
|
|
| User: "bobber" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 10:28:10 AM |
|
|
and your point is? plug your political beliefs in a time of such
tragedy! pumping stations hut down because they need massive power and
don't run on generators.
.
|
|
|
| User: "Bob Eldred" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 08:35:01 PM |
|
|
"bobber" <musicboy333@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1125761290.021874.87760@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
and your point is? plug your political beliefs in a time of such
tragedy! pumping stations hut down because they need massive power and
don't run on generators.
At least some of them are diesel but the don't run under water.
.
|
|
|
|
| User: "" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 07:51:43 PM |
|
|
Your own political beliefs seem to be well pluged in to the deniel of
basic facts outlet.
.
|
|
|
| User: "Hatunen" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 09:26:47 PM |
|
|
On 3 Sep 2005 17:51:43 -0700, wrote:
Your own political beliefs seem to be well pluged in to the deniel of
basic facts outlet.
Whose political beliefs? You haven't left a single clue as to who
you might be talking to.
************* DAVE HATUNEN (hatunen@cox.net) *************
* Tucson Arizona, out where the cacti grow *
* My typos & mispellings are intentional copyright traps *
.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| User: "" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 06:33:37 AM |
|
|
how about not building up urban settles near flood plain or reclaim
sea and having an education system that emphasize family planning. to
have fewer children 2 to 3
each 2 years apart. too many people is hinderance
if disaster struck casualties would be small, and humanity assistance
can be met
it's the poor and uneducated mostly blacks were left behind in new
orleans.
the rich and smart people left town a day earlier
if another storm was to struck the chance of the 60,000 stranded on
roof top is zero
.
|
|
|
| User: "" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
03 Sep 2005 07:50:58 AM |
|
|
Like wars on terrorism, and wars on drugs, you have to strike the
hurricane at the source!. This means that the US has the right to
invade part of the african desert and set up "counterhurricane
machines", which can reverse and neutralize the tiny swirls in the
atmosphere, before it becomes big!
Just a thought :)
maurya@hotmail.com wrote:
how about not building up urban settles near flood plain or reclaim
sea and having an education system that emphasize family planning. to
have fewer children 2 to 3
each 2 years apart. too many people is hinderance
if disaster struck casualties would be small, and humanity assistance
can be met
it's the poor and uneducated mostly blacks were left behind in new
orleans.
the rich and smart people left town a day earlier
if another storm was to struck the chance of the 60,000 stranded on
roof top is zero
.
|
|
|
|
| User: "Gman" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
07 Sep 2005 01:22:50 AM |
|
|
The poor couldn't get out. Many don't have cars, regardless of their
intelligence.
"maurya@hotmail.com" <zinssaii@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1125747217.142407.162260@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
how about not building up urban settles near flood plain or reclaim
sea and having an education system that emphasize family planning. to
have fewer children 2 to 3
each 2 years apart. too many people is hinderance
if disaster struck casualties would be small, and humanity assistance
can be met
it's the poor and uneducated mostly blacks were left behind in new
orleans.
the rich and smart people left town a day earlier
if another storm was to struck the chance of the 60,000 stranded on
roof top is zero
.
|
|
|
| User: "RP" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
07 Sep 2005 01:35:29 AM |
|
|
Gman wrote:
The poor couldn't get out. Many don't have cars, regardless of their
intelligence.
I'll bet they're smarter and faster next time, cars or no cars. They
have feet don't they? People simply didn't expect this hurricane to be
any worse than those in the past, and that was because they weren't
educated enough. I've personally been through several hurricanes, once
having had the eye pass directly over. No big deal, a little flooding
some trees uprooted, houses damaged, thought we were going to perish,
the usual, but we knew the odds. Because of past experience a category 5
would've sent chills up my spine, and my feet wouldn't have waited for
the rest of me. That's called nothing more than "paying attention",
which requires only a minimum of intelligence. I can see some of these
people standing in their yard saying something like "Ooh, look at that
tornado over there sucking up Uncle Amos' roof, sheeit, give me another
hit of that crack."
Richard Perry
"maurya@hotmail.com" <zinssaii@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1125747217.142407.162260@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
how about not building up urban settles near flood plain or reclaim
sea and having an education system that emphasize family planning. to
have fewer children 2 to 3
each 2 years apart. too many people is hinderance
if disaster struck casualties would be small, and humanity assistance
can be met
it's the poor and uneducated mostly blacks were left behind in new
orleans.
the rich and smart people left town a day earlier
if another storm was to struck the chance of the 60,000 stranded on
roof top is zero
.
|
|
|
| User: "Gman" |
|
| Title: Re: How to stop hurricanes |
07 Sep 2005 09:29:50 AM |
|
|
How do you get out of New Orleans on foot and where would you go? What if
they don't have a TV? Would they even know to get out? I don't pretend to
know what it's like to live in poverty. Do you?
"RP" <no_mail_no_spam@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:lPqdnXReKqtjFIPeRVn-pw@centurytel.net...
Gman wrote:
The poor couldn't get out. Many don't have cars, regardless of their
intelligence.
I'll bet they're smarter and faster next time, cars or no cars. They have
feet don't they? People simply didn't expect this hurricane to be any
worse than those in the past, and that was because they weren't educated
enough. I've personally been through several hurricanes, once having had
the eye pass directly over. No big deal, a little flooding some trees
uprooted, houses damaged, thought we were going to perish, the usual, but
we knew the odds. Because of past experience a category 5 would've sent
chills up my spine, and my feet wouldn't have waited for the rest of me.
That's called nothing more than "paying attention", which requires only a
minimum of intelligence. I can see some of these people standing in their
yard saying something like "Ooh, look at that tornado over there sucking
up Uncle Amos' roof, sheeit, give me another hit of that crack."
Richard Perry
"maurya@hotmail.com" <zinssaii@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1125747217.142407.162260@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
how about not building up urban settles near flood plain or reclaim
sea and having an education system that emphasize family planning. to
have fewer children 2 to 3
each 2 years apart. too many people is hinderance
if disaster struck casualties would be small, and humanity assistance
can be met
it's the poor and uneducated mostly blacks were left behind in new
orleans.
the rich and smart people left town a day earlier
if another storm was to struck the chance of the 60,000 stranded on
roof top is zero
.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Related Articles |
|
|
