Climate Change Intensifies Atlantic Hurricanes, Amplifying Wind Speeds and Rapid Storm Strengthening Across 2024 Season

Recent studies have highlighted the growing impact of climate change on Atlantic hurricanes, with record-breaking ocean temperatures, driven by human-caused pollution, making these storms stronger and more dangerous.

According to an analysis by Climate Central, all 11 hurricanes in the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season were intensified by human-induced climate change, with their wind speeds increased by 9 to 28 mph due to warmer waters. This trend has been ongoing, and scientists assert that every hurricane in 2024 was more potent than it would have been 100 years ago, a direct result of planet-warming pollution.

The study’s findings are part of a broader analysis that examined hurricanes from 2019 to 2023, revealing that 84% of these storms were also more intense than they would have been without climate change. These hurricanes experienced an average wind speed increase of 18 mph, and for 30 of them, this was enough to push them up at least one category on the Saffir-Simpson scale.

The research underscores the significant role human activity, particularly carbon emissions, plays in worsening the intensity of storms, with ocean warming being the primary driver of this effect.

At least 90% of the global warming observed in recent decades has occurred in the oceans, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). This has had a direct impact on hurricane behavior, with ocean temperatures in the Atlantic remaining at or near record levels throughout the hurricane season.

Warmer waters provide additional energy for storms, allowing them to strengthen more rapidly and intensify at a faster pace. The phenomenon of rapid intensification, where a hurricane’s wind speed increases by at least 35 mph in 24 hours, has become more frequent in recent years, further exacerbating the risks posed by these storms.

One notable example of this rapid intensification is Hurricane Milton, which increased wind speed by 95 mph in just 24 hours, making it the fastest intensifying storm in the Gulf of Mexico.

Climate Central’s analysis suggests that human-caused climate change made such extreme intensification 400 to 800 times more likely and that Milton wouldn’t have reached Category 5 without this added ocean heat. The study also found that hurricanes Debby and Oscar would have remained tropical storms, rather than strengthening into hurricanes, in the absence of climate change.

While the study’s findings are widely supported by the scientific community, some experts caution against projecting future storm intensities based solely on current trends.

Jim Kossin, a retired NOAA climate scientist, emphasized that while human-caused global warming is indeed intensifying storms, predicting the exact future impact is more complex due to other variables affecting ocean temperatures and hurricane dynamics. Nevertheless, experts agree that as global temperatures continue to rise, the likelihood of more powerful and destructive hurricanes, similar to those observed in 2024, is increasingly certain.