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+--- Thread: Article Did the Tonga eruption cause this year's extreme heat? (/thread-14566.html)
Did the Tonga eruption cause this year's extreme heat? - C C - Aug 27, 2023
https://www.livescience.com/planet-earth/climate-change/did-the-tonga-eruption-cause-this-years-extreme-heat
INTRO: The Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai eruption in January 2022 was one of the biggest volcanic eruptions in recorded history. Detonating underwater with the force of 100 Hiroshima bombs, the blast sent millions of tons of water vapor high into the atmosphere. [Water vapor is the peculiar trait of the eruption that could have potentially swung it toward warming rather than cooling.]
Some commentators have speculated in recent weeks that the volcano is to blame for searing summer temperatures and are even using the volcano to cast doubt on the role humans are playing in climate change, as reported by The Hill.
So is the gigantic eruption responsible for this summer's sweltering conditions?
"The short answer is no," Gloria Manney, a senior research scientist at NorthWest Research Associates and New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, and Luis Millán, a research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, told Live Science together in an email.
"Even though El Niño has made the global temperature higher and the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai eruption might have affected some regions for a short time, the main culprit is climate change," they said.
And numerous studies show that the massive eruption isn't causing this climate change — human activites such as the burning of fossil fuels are the driving factor... (MORE - details)
RE: Did the Tonga eruption cause this year's extreme heat? - Syne - Aug 27, 2023
Seems to be an appeal to authority, with no tangible argument.
"And numerous studies show that the massive eruption isn't causing this climate change — human activites such as the burning of fossil fuels are the driving factor."
"Numerous," but unnamed studies. But...who claimed this one eruption, alone, was "causing this climate change?" I've only seen articles saying this eruption plus El Nino plus solar fluctuations are "exacerbating," not "causing," "this climate change."
However, the extremes this year are sharper than anthropogenic global warming alone would be expected to cause. Human activities that release greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere have been increasing temperatures gradually, at an average of 0.2 degrees Fahrenheit (0.1 Celsius) per decade.
Three additional natural factors are also helping drive up global temperatures and fuel disasters this year: El Niño, solar fluctuations and a massive underwater volcanic eruption.
Unfortunately, these factors are combining in a way that is exacerbating global warming. Still worse, we can expect unusually high temperatures to continue through at least 2025, which means even more extreme weather in the near future.
- https://fortune.com/2023/07/27/why-extreme-heat-not-just-climate-change-el-nino-volcano/
RE: Did the Tonga eruption cause this year's extreme heat? - confused2 - Aug 28, 2023
The way I see it..
Global warming can only be caused by more energy entering the atmosphere than leaving it.
Edit .. CO2 is widely believed to reduce the amount of energy leaving at the current average temperature hence the Earth warms to bring energy arriving and energy leaving back into equilibrium.
Nothing on the surface of the Earth can affect global warming with the possible exception of reflecting more (or less) light back into space.
Ice melts at exactly 0 Centigrade so is sensitive to small changes in temperature .. anything else .. not so much.