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Mike Groll / AP file
In this aerial photo, people walk amid the destruction left in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, on Oct. 31 in Seaside Heights, N.J.
The federal government is facing significant financial risks related to extreme weather events, and states and cities can no longer depend on it for extra help after such events occur, the Republican chairman of House Oversight and Government Reform Committee said Friday.
The warning from Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., came at a press conference about the release of a new report by the Government Accountability Office, which identified “climate change” on its 2013 list of items presenting high risk to the federal government.
The report said the federal government faces financial challenges from climate change, including the costs of weather-related damage to property it owns, losses through flood insurance and crop support programs, and costs of emergency aid in disasters.
“These events are primarily the responsibilities of the cities and states,” Issa said at the news conference. “And I will point out that we can no longer assume that the federal government will come in with an emergency supplemental [funding] every time there is an [extreme weather] occurrence. We have a responsibility to be proactive: Proactive in asking the states and the cities to be prepared to meet more of these requirements. Proactive in making sure that we withhold the funds, either through insurance funds or through actual appropriations, that are appropriate for the real anticipated events.”
The GAO noted that the Federal Emergency Management Agency is on the hook for more than $80 billion in aid for disasters declared during the 2004-2011 fiscal years -- and the White House asked for more than $60 billion in aid to help the East Coast recover from Hurricane Sandy.
Read the GAO report in PDF form
And yet, the report says, the government has not been coordinating a response to climate change among its agencies --- partly a problem of the complexity of the issue. The report advises that a strategic plan be developed, directed at common goals for all federal agencies.
The report is a biennial assessment of government operations it deems at high risk for fraud, waste, abuse and mismanagement or as otherwise "needing broad-based transformation." Some of its other recommendations:
- Develop a better understanding of how a changing climate will affect the large federal flood and crop insurance programs. For instance, the report said, sea-level rise and long-term erosion should be considered when flood maps are updated.
- Develop a federal approach to providing climate data to state and local governments so they can make better decisions.
- Develop better criteria for FEMA to assess a jurisdiction's ability to recover on its own after a disaster.
In a related issue, the report also says looming gaps in coverage by polar-orbiting weather satellites could affect forecasts and "warnings of extreme events."
The satellites provide a global perspective each morning and afternoon. The report said the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has acknowledged there could be a gap of 17 to 53 months between the time the current afternoon satellite fails and the time a new one can be launched to replace it.
The report also noted that the risk of a gap exists in coverage by the satellite in the morning orbit -- if the Department of Defense's next satellites don't work as intended.
The report said NOAA officials believe these gaps "would result in less accurate and timely weather forecasts and warnings of extreme events, such as hurricanes, storm surges and floods."
After the report’s release, members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee held a news conference at which both Democrats and Republicans acknowledged the government’s significant fiscal exposure as a result of weather related disasters.
Issa called it a “nonpartisan” issue, while ranking Democrat Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., labeled the GAO report “a wake-up call” for Congress to start paying attention to impacts of climate change.
In total, the GAO report listed 30 federal programs and operations on its high-risk list. Climate change risk and the weather satellite gap were both new additions. Management of interagency contracting and IRS business systems modernization both were removed from the list because the GAO decided that sufficient progress had been made to address past vulnerabilities.
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Leave a Comment:
The only high risk is the billions that government has wasted on this scam.
Flat temperatures for 16 years. No change in drought in 60 years. Antarctica still gaining ice. Most Antarctic sea ice extent ever recorded in 2012. Over 7 years (longest time since 1900) that the US has not been hit by a major hurricane. 2012 set a new record for the fewest tornadoes in July. 2012 total tornado numbers well below average.
Does this really sound like something to worry about?
In 1954 three Cat 3 hurricanes hit the east cost. Totally natural.
In 2012 one extratropical cyclone (not even a Cat 1 hurricane anymore) hit the east coast. So weaker and fewer storms mean things are worse today?
People need to learn how to search and read old newspapers and compare the damage and deaths from storms 50, 100, 150, 200 years ago. They will find that things are pretty darn good these days.
But instead they listen to grant grubbing talking heads that make their living off of the tax payer telling everyone (but themselves of course) have to cut back and change their lifestyles.
When the alarmists actually start living like they are alarmed then will people that can think for themselves begin to pay attention.
But as long as they fly all over the world, staying in fancy hotels and eating feast after feast using limos and drinking champagne they are just showing what a scam it is.
Notice how all these so called experts never, ever present any data when they spout off to the media? Because they know that with the internet it is very easy for anyone to find the latest data and records that prove them wrong. That's why they never debate.
Let's see the raw data if it really shows what they say? They refuse to present the data. They refuse to describe and explain their formula and equations.
Science is all about being able to reproduce the results to prove something.
But they don't want anyone reproducing the studies and experiments because they are afraid.
That isn't science. That's a scam.
Liberals love to claim they have science on their side while hurling denier insults at any one that disagrees with them, but the only science that has any evidence behind it is that the Earth’s temperature has risen over the past 100 years, and that human activities have resulted in a steady atmospheric CO2 increase. Based on that science you could call me part of the 97% that agrees.
The rest is all based on models and predictions that have not been substantiated in the least. In fact many recent studies are showing far greater impact to the climate due to previously unknown solar effects.
But they just choose to ignore any studies they disagree with and put their fingers in their ears and close their eyes while they just yell DENIER! DENIER! DENIER!
Please post references to support this claim.
Well last time I tried I could not post links, but if you really are interested then you could google
The 2nd Nagoya Workshop on the Relationship between Solar Activity and Climate Changes
for starters.
The fact that such a workshop even exists discussing the solar/climate relationship at all, especially when alarmists say there’s no solar connection, should tell you something.
I'm quite familiar with the papers presented at that meeting, RCL. What findings, in particular, are you referring to? No links needed - just a summary of the facts will do.
No one claims that the Sun has no impact on our climate. That would simply be ridiculous. But climate scientists say that solar activity cannot explain our current heating. In fact, total solar irradiance and temperature have been moving in opposite directions for 40+ years now.
Nagoya was focused on cloud formation, which can have both positive and negative feedbacks. You're in over your head here.
Crickets......
That's the way it always goes, Greg...
Just recently:
". . . the IPCC’s sensitivity estimate cannot readily be reconciled with forcing estimates and observational data." – James Annan
You know who he is right? You know a full fledged member of "the consensus"
You are a true wealth of disinformation, RCL.
Annan claimed that it was 'most unlikely' (95% confidence level) that climate sensitivity would exceed 4.5C - a fact that the climate community, in general, has long agreed with - including the IPCC. Climate sensitivity is recognized to be within the range of 2C - 4.5C, with the most likely value of 3C.
If any of those terms are unfamiliar to you, you are voicing an uninformed opinion here, and nothing more.
Try as hard as you want to criticize me, but sorry, those are his words not mine as much as you don't like it. Here's more, his words not mine:
...that the IPCC’s sensitivity estimate cannot readily be reconciled with forcing estimates and observational data. All the recent literature that approaches the question from this angle comes up with similar answers. By failing to meet this problem head-on, the IPCC authors now find themselves in a bit of a pickle. I expect them to brazen it out, on the grounds that they are the experts and are quite capable of squaring the circle before breakfast if need be. But in doing so, they risk being seen as not so much summarising scientific progress, but obstructing it.
You didn't even read the entire piece in question, did you, RLC? Annan says this:
Cherry-picking is disgusting when important issues are involved. Read the whole thing, or risk looking like a fool.
And James Annan who by the way if you don't know is , a scientist with the Global Change Projection Research Programme of the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology. He says about the Zickfeld et al PNAS opinion poll:
The list of pollees in the Zickfeld paper are largely the self-same people responsible for the largely bogus analyses that I’ve criticised over recent years, and which even if they were valid then, are certainly outdated now. Interestingly, one of them stated quite openly in a meeting I attended a few years ago that he deliberately lied in these sort of elicitation exercises (i.e. exaggerating the probability of high sensitivity) in order to help motivate political action.
But the true believers in CAGW just ignore this sort of thing and brush it off with excuses. No we have science on our side.
Isaa what a POS! This should be a national security issue, these events affect EVERYBODY in some way. We need a strong federal govt to come help when a town is wiped off the map. How can some of the communities assume the role of clean up when their infrastructure is destroyed. Climate change, whether man made or not is happening and we need to step up to the plate and plan for such events. I would not at all object to paying a few more dollars in taxes help keep things like FEMA funded. Moron Republicans keep wanting to take more away from the little people and give it to their masters. Hopefully the country will vote these backward thinking f#cks out in 14.
Anybody out there see the report from some of the UN'S IPCC that stated the greatest cause of "global warming" now "climate change", was, now hold on to your head so it doesn't explode, the sun. Guess what, they also concluded that whenever there was a global warming trend, there were also bumper crop reports. Guess what else, CO2 is fuel for plant life, which said plants turn into oxygen for us breathing creatures. You know why you didn't see the report from those scientists -- it was squashed because it went against the global cap and trade scheme to punish us with taxes for causing harm to mother earth and to fund Agenda 21 activities.
YES..
THE
SOCIALIST / COMMUNIST Wannabe
CLIMATE
THAT OBAMA
PROFESSES
AND
EXPOUNDS..
IS THE MOST
DANGEROUS
PROBLEM..
ALL
OVER..
The LEVELS
OF
Bu.l.l....SHYTTE
IN
THE
AIR
ARE
RISING
DAILY
AL"GEEZED-ZERO"..GORE
Has Found a Way ..To Recycle..Camel DUNG..
And Make Half a BILLION..DOLLARS...
What a Socialist Savior..of The Pocket..Book..
While most of the people on this blog argue about whether climate change really exists or not, those of us who have to deal with the realities of the situation - farmers and growers, among others - will continue to try to produce food for the populace, working with whatever nature throws at us. Climate change is a fact of life for us (has been for at least ten years) and involves ridge tilling during endless rains, and irrigation during persistent drought, which we are in at the moment. The price of food has already increased and will continue to edge higher, due to battling these extremes. Too many people now have no contact with the natural world and little understanding of how we fit into Earth's systems, including production of our food. We are by no means acting as responsible members of our planet's communities.
You know, they might get me to pay attention if they would call it Weather Related Occurences.
That would be something to maybe plan for...
But, calling it climate change, just makes me think they still want to tax me more to pay for it.
And they left out " man-made " from the article as to not rile up people who know it's BS.
Well when you you live to close to the coast line or the big rivers guess what sooner or later you will get wet, if you can't good insurance coverage then you should not even be there. It don't figure why anyone would want to build anything where there is a chance of flooding. I built my sweet home on the rock on the mount, my mother didn't raise any fools and bless her sweet heart she is still right here with us, when we leave the house we just coast a while then put it in gear and let out on the clutch and start up and go ha !
When most animals sense that their food source decreases due to the climate change they decrease their reproduction. They (animals) got more common sense then us humans.