Stronger hurricanes may accompany global warming, according to a study released by NOAA scientists. The study used an operational hurricane prediction model that simulates realistic hurricane structures.

Most hurricanes do not reach their maximum potential intensity before weakening over land or cooler ocean regions. However, those storms that do approach their upper-limit intensity are expected to be slightly stronger in the warmer climate due to the higher sea surface temperatures. A 5- to 12- percent increase in wind speeds for the strongest hurricanes is projected if tropical sea surfaces warm by 4 degrees Fahrenheit, according to the study in the Feb. 13 issue of Science by meteorologists at NOAA's Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, located in Princeton, N.J.

The NOAA scientists simulated samples of hurricanes from both the present-day climate and from a greenhouse-gas warmed climate by linking information from their laboratory's global climate model into a high-resolution hurricane prediction model. The hurricane prediction model is the one currently used at the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Prediction, the nation's center for computer-based weather prediction.

In the study, only storms for the northwest tropical Pacific near the Philippine Islands were examined. The strongest typhoons (the term used for hurricanes in the northwest Pacific) in the present climate are found in this region. Possible changes in the frequency or location of occurrence of hurricanes were not addressed in the study.

For more information about climate change research, visit the NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory Web page at www.gfdl.gov/gfdl_research.html or contact Dane Konop at (301) 713-2483.