SUNBURY – Is climate change affecting snowfall amounts across the U.S? One meteorologist thinks so. Elliot Abrams, Chief Forecaster and Senior Vice President of AccuWeather was a guest on WKOK’s On The Mark and says warmer temperatures mean more water vapor in the atmosphere, “We are seeing more extreme precipitation events these days and I think that goes along with the idea of climate change. One idea is that if it’s warming slightly, the atmosphere overall can accommodate more water vapor than it could when it wasn’t as warm. So, if you have more water vapor available and then a storm uses that water vapor and all the condensation that goes on to make the precipitation, you’re going to get more and you’ll have more extremes.”
Abrams says climate change is a very gradual process and is expensive to combat, “That is one of the problems. It’s so gradual and yet the fixes are so expensive.” He says it will take decades of continued research to know the true effects of climate change on the global environment. (Jennifer Wakeman)
