1. DO WE KNOW HOW STORMS WILL CHANGE IN A WARMING CLIMATE? William B. Rossow NOAA CREST at The City College of New York June 2013

2. Mythical Answer:YES Because T↑ => Q ↑ => Clouds & Precip↑ Fantasy Answer:YES Because the Models say so Best Answer:NO

3. Prior Questions What is the current day distribution of storm strengths? –Only recently completed surveys now revealing key details What causes the rarer stronger storms? –Better precipitation & radiation datasets now allow diagnosis How are weak and strong storms coupled to the general circulation? –Different heating but not known -- here is an approach

4. TOA NET RADIATION & CLOUD EFFECTS

5. SRF NET RADIATION & CLOUD EFFECTS

6. HEAT TRANSPORT IMPLIED BY RADIATIVE IMBALANCE BY ATMOSPHERE BY OCEAN

7. ATM NET LW RAD & CLOUD EFFECTS

9. Hurricane Ileana A B MODIS 12 µm (Channel 32) 23 Aug 2006 2100 UTC 10 CloudSat Radar Reflectivity (dBZ) AB Height (km) 20 0 Eye 20 10 0 -10 -20 -30 CloudSat and tropical cyclones -- So far we have intersected the eyes of 4 different tropical cyclones

10. Tropical Weather States

11. COMPARISON OF ORDINARY TO ORGANIZED CONVECTION CLOUDSAT VIEW WS3WS1

12. Distribution of Tropical Precipitation by Weather State

13. LW CRE at Surface & TOA Atmospheric Heating/Cooling Heating Cooling Heating

14. THE PERFECT STORM

16. Composite of Diabatic Heating of Atmosphere with Cyclone Strength PRECIP RAD

17. SO WE KNOW THAT STORMS HEAT THE ATMOSPHERE WE KNOW THAT THERE IS A WIDE RANGE OF STORM TYPES AND STRENGTHS WE DON’T KNOW HOW THESE DIFFERENT STORMS ARE COUPLED TO THE GENERAL CIRCULATION SO WE DON’T KNOW HOW THEY WILL CHANGE IN A WARMING CLIMATE BUT HERE IS WHAT WE CAN DO

18. Analysis Approaches Tropics: Track Mesoscale Convective Systems, Develop Convective Classification, Investigate Convection Initiation & Dynamics (High Time Resolution), Develop Lagrangian Correspondence of Environment & Convective Types, Conduct Large-Domain CRM & GCM Experiments Midlatitudes: Track Cyclones, Develop Cyclone Classification, Diagnose Diabatic Heating Processes, Investigate Internal (Lagrangian) Heating & Dynamics, Conduct GCM Experiments Global: Global Weather States & Properties, Indices of Strength of General Circulation, Investigate GWS Distributions & Changes with Circulation Strength, Conduct GCM Experiments

19. Lifecycle of Tropical Convective System

20. Level of Neutral Buoyancy

22. ISCCP GLOBAL WEATHER STATES

23. CVS DISTRIBUTIONS FOR GLOBAL WEATHER STATES

24. 500 MB VERTICAL VELOCITY DISTRIBUTIONS FOR GWS