Reply To: Get used to violent swings in the weather

[Dr Martin Williams [account from Drupal site]]

Report in Scientific American on survey revealing there seems to be change underway towards already wet places becoming wetter, and places with little rain becoming even drier. Includes:

Quote:

Now new measurements of the ocean's salinity prove that prediction—and suggest that global warming strengthens the water cycle even more than anticipated.

"What we found is that regions that are salty in the main are becoming saltier" and areas that boast more rainfall are getting fresher, explains oceanographer Paul Durack of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, who led the research to be published in Science on April 27. "It's another independent estimate of how the climate is changing as we pump out CO2."

..

The increase in warm water vapor as the globe heats will fuel more violent storms, whereas droughts in places like Australia, stuck in the middle of oceanic regions dominated by evaporation, will only grow more severe. Or as Durack says: "wet regions will get wetter and dry regions drier."

Where It Rains, It Will Pour–Otherwise, Tough Luck

Ocean floats provide yet more evidence of global warming, revealing that rainy regions are getting wetter and dry regions drier much faster than predicted