Report Foresees Hot, Wet Weather

DOYLESTOWN, Pa. -- How’s the weather?

Recent reports about Bucks County’s changing climate – from three days a year now at 95 degrees or higher to 37 annually, and more of those severe, deadly rainstorms like the one that struck this past July – have been followed up by a new analysis offering a grim overview of conditions.

The just-released Fifth National Climate Assessment documented the effects of changes in the climate in different parts of the United States including Bucks County, Pa. and the Northeast.

Extreme weather patterns in the Bucks region have unleashed deluges that overwhelm infrastructures, and leave streets and neighborhoods submerged, the report said, adding the extreme weather events have cost the United States an estimated $150 billion each year.

The report also made recommendations for forestalling the worst impact of climate change and limiting global temperature increases by working toward carbon neutrality.

Increasing temperature are a concern in Bucks County, according to projections. From 1990 through 2019, the county averaged three days a year with temperatures above 95 degrees. But within the coming decades, the number of 95-plus days each year increases to 19 to 37 by 2070. Along with the heat comes increases in cooling costs, reduced air quality and heat-related illnesses.

The flash flooding that killed several people in Bucks County in July came from a storm that dropped a month’s worth of rain in two hours – the kind of extreme weather that is becoming more common due to human-caused climate change, the study said. In fact, according to the assessment, extreme precipitation events across the region have increased by 60 percent in the past six decades.

Hurricanes and the heavy storms have triggered devastating floods in Bucks and the region, notably in storms from the remnants of Hurricane Ida in 2021 and Tropical Storm Isaias in 2020.

In releasing the climate review, the White House said Americans this year have experienced more than two dozen weather and climate disasters.

“One of the most direct ways that Americans experience climate change is through increases in the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events,” said the report.

(Some of you might be thinking this is nothing but a ‘liberal’ report, but what about the facts? Send a comment and share this.)

Analysis sees more heavy rain storms.Photo byGianandrea VillaonUnsplash