Just a month after a torrent of rain plowed through central Maine towns, the advocacy group Environment Maine Tuesday released a study documenting that “extreme downpours” of rain and snow have been increasing for more than a half century in Maine. They are hitting the state – and all of New England – far more often.
And the study contends that the dramatic storms will become even more intense and frequent in years to come, resulting in untold human casualties and billions of dollars in property damages.
“When it rains, it pours – especially in recent years as bigger storms have hit Maine more often,” said Ben Seel, clean energy organizer for Environment Maine, who presented the findings of the study. “We need to heed scientists’ warnings that this dangerous trend is linked to global warming and do everything we can to cut carbon pollution today.”
The 43-page study was funded by Frontier Group, an environmental think tank in Santa Barbara, Calif. The report examines trends in severe rain and snow storms from 1948 to 2011 and explains that the storms, known as “extreme downpours,” are fueled by increased evaporation and the ability of a warmer atmosphere to hold more moisture.
During the last 64 years, New England suffered more often from the increase in these storms than any other part of the country, with an increase of 85 percent in the number of significantly more intense snowfall and rain storms.
In Maine, the storms occurred 74 percent more often than in the mid-20th century.
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