{"id":381978,"date":"2025-06-07T18:37:34","date_gmt":"2025-06-07T16:37:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=381978"},"modified":"2025-06-07T18:37:35","modified_gmt":"2025-06-07T16:37:35","slug":"nyts-thirsty-atmosphere-claim-falls-flat-real-data-debunks-drought-alarmism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=381978","title":{"rendered":"NYT\u2019s \u2018Thirsty Atmosphere\u2019 Claim Falls Flat: Real Data Debunks Drought Alarmism"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"
ChatGPT<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From ClimateRealism<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Anthony Watts<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The New York Times<\/em> (NYT) claims in its recent article, by Rebecca Dzombak, \u201cIt\u2019s Not Just Poor Rains Causing Drought. The Atmosphere Is \u2018Thirstier,\u2019\u201d<\/em><\/a> that global warming is intensifying droughts by creating a \u201cthirstier atmosphere\u201d that sucks more moisture from the land. This assertion is false, clearly debunked by real-world data. The idea that a warming atmosphere is increasingly \u201cdemanding\u201d water anthropomorphizes a complex physical process, and worse, ignores major natural variables\u2014like volcanic activity and regional climate drivers\u2014that actually influence drought more directly. Evidence suggests there is a record amount of water vapor in the atmosphere now, that droughts are regional, not global, and that \u201catmospheric thirst\u201d is more rhetorical flourish than scientific fact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s begin with semantics. The atmosphere is not a sentient entity\u2014it doesn\u2019t get \u201cthirstier.\u201d That is a term more appropriate for a Gatorade commercial<\/a> than climate science. What the researchers are referring to is an increase in potential evapotranspiration<\/a>, a concept that has been well known for decades. Higher temperatures can increase the potential for evaporation\u2014but that doesn\u2019t mean evaporation always increases. Factors like humidity, cloud cover, soil moisture, ground cover, and wind speed all play major roles, and those often vary independently of global temperature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even more crucially, this narrative conveniently omits one of the most significant injections of water vapor into the atmosphere in recent history: the eruption of the Hunga Tonga\u2013Hunga Ha\u02bbapai volcano in January 2022. According to a 2022 study published in Geophysical Research Letters<\/em><\/a>, the eruption blasted approximately 146 teragrams (146 million metric tons) of water vapor into the stratosphere\u2014enough to increase global stratospheric water vapor by 10%. It documented a massive, unprecedented increase in stratospheric water vapor<\/strong> from a natural volcanic event\u2014an event that should absolutely be part of any honest discussion about current atmospheric moisture and so-called \u201cthirstier\u201d drought models.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That Hunga Tonga\u2019s injection of water vapor clearly shows up in the data from Copernicus<\/a> as seen in the figure below:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Figure: Annual anomalies in the average amount of total column water vapour over the 60\u00b0S\u201360\u00b0N domain relative to the average for the 1992\u20132020 reference period. The anomalies are expressed as a percentage of the 1992\u20132020 average. Data: ERA5. Credit: C3S\/ECMWF.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s not a minor blip, and it blows the NYT idea of a \u201cthirstier\u201d atmosphere clear out of the water. Water vapor is the most potent greenhouse gas<\/a>, and this sudden influx significantly influences short-term atmospheric dynamics, including regional precipitation patterns and, yes, drought. Funny how the NYY fails to mention this natural event that throws a wrench in their narrative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\u2019s more, the NYT article leans heavily on a model-based study that attempts to back-calculate \u201catmospheric thirst\u201d going back to 1901. But here\u2019s the catch: models are only as good as the assumptions and data you feed into them. The International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report (AR6), Chapter 12, clearly states that \u201cthere is low confidence in the human influence on observed changes in meteorological droughts globally\u201d (IPCC AR6 Chapter 12, Section 12.3.2<\/a>). The IPCC\u2014the supposed gold standard of climate consensus\u2014explicitly distances itself from attributing droughts to human-caused climate change. Yet the NYT conveniently skips that detail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rather than climate change causing a long-term trend of increasing droughts, the IPCC also reports with \u201chigh confidence\u201d that precipitation has increased over mid-latitude land areas of the Northern Hemisphere (including the United States) during the past 70 years, and the agency expresses \u201clow confidence\u201d about any negative trends globally. So the \u201cthirstier\u201d climate is dropping more precipitation back to Earth, resulting in less \u201cthirsty\u201d soil. You can\u2019t have it both ways, if the Earth is getting more rain, it can\u2019t be drying out \u2013 and years of drought data show that it is not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Drought is a regional phenomenon driven by local weather patterns, ocean currents like ENSO<\/a> (El Ni\u00f1o\u2013Southern Oscillation), and natural variability, not some imaginary global \u201cdrought machine.\u201d As the Climate at a Glance<\/a> summary from The Heartland Institute points out, data from the U.S. and global sources do not support the claim that droughts are becoming historically unprecedented. In fact, one peer-reviewed study<\/a> found that the most intense global droughts of the last 120 years occurred in the early to mid-20th century, long before the recent increase in CO\u2082 emissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although the NYT article that there has been a 74 percent increase in drought-affected area between 2018 and 2022, even if true, the statistic is nothing more than a a short-term snapshot influenced by factors like La Ni\u00f1a events, reduced solar activity, and, again, the Tonga eruption. Cherry-picking short timescales is a hallmark of climate alarmism. If they\u2019d extended the dataset to include the Dust Bowl of the 1930s<\/a> or severe droughts in the 1950s<\/a>, or even data over the past 30 years, no increasing trend of areas affected by drought would show in the data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The NYT also assumes that the purported increase in atmospheric water vapor will broadly negatively impact human life. But higher carbon dioxide concentrations and modest warming have resulted in longer growing seasons and enhanced carbon dioxide fertilization<\/a>, which has dramatically boosted crop yields and improved drought resilience in crops. Any anthropogenic increase in water demand is not due to climate change, but population growth, accompanied by increased agricultural and urban water use. Rising water demand can be met by adaptation\u2014not hysteria. As the NYT article mentions, some farmers are updating irrigation systems. That\u2019s good. But blaming the need for irrigation upgrades on climate change is like blaming a new set of tires on the existence of roads.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lastly, we\u2019re told that \u201cthe trend is set to continue\u201d\u2014again based on model projections, that are untested and not based on observed trends. But history has shown us that nature often defies the climate models. In the early 2000s, scientists predicted permanent drought<\/a> (so-called \u201cclimate aridification\u201d) in California, only for the state to swing to record-breaking wet years<\/a> just a decade later. Nature is variable<\/em>, not linear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In conclusion, the NYT article is a masterclass example of turning natural variability and questionable modeling into a headline-ready climate crisis story. By attributing regional droughts to global temperature trends and anthropomorphizing the atmosphere as \u201cthirsty,\u201d they abandon scientific rigor in favor of sensational storytelling. Compounding their error, the NYT ignores countervailing data on rainfall, long-term drought, and even the IPCC\u2019s own cautious language on drought attribution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When news outlets resort to metaphors about \u201cthirsty skies\u201d and glaringly omit factual explanations, they\u2019re not informing\u2014they\u2019re indoctrinating. Honest climate reporting requires a lot less narrative and a lot more reference to the hallmarks of the scientific method: available data and testable propositions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The New York Times (NYT) claims in its recent article, by Rebecca Dzombak, \u201cIt\u2019s Not Just Poor Rains Causing Drought. The Atmosphere Is \u2018Thirstier,\u2019\u201d that global warming is intensifying droughts by creating a \u201cthirstier atmosphere\u201d that sucks more moisture from the land. This assertion is false, clearly debunked by real-world data. The idea that a warming atmosphere is increasingly \u201cdemanding\u201d water anthropomorphizes a complex physical process, and worse, ignores major natural variables\u2014like volcanic activity and regional climate drivers\u2014that actually influence drought more directly. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":381986,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691829997,691835676,691835675,691835674,691818087,691835673,691823155,691835672,691819657],"class_list":["post-381978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-carbon-dioxide-co","tag-droughts-in-the-1950s","tag-dust-bowl-of-the-1930s","tag-enso-el-nino-southern-oscillation-3","tag-global-warming","tag-hunga-tonga-hunga-haapai-volcano","tag-new-york-times-nyt","tag-rebecca-dzombak","tag-water-vapor","fallback-thumbnail"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/0ChatGPT-Image-7.-Juni-2025-18_36_05.png?fit=1024%2C1024&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1BmW","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":255559,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=255559","url_meta":{"origin":381978,"position":0},"title":"Rest Easy, New York Times, Popular Coffee Cultivars are Safe","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"05\/02\/2023","format":false,"excerpt":"By contrast, worldwide coffee trends are very positive amid modest global climate change.","rel":"","context":"In \"Climate change\"","block_context":{"text":"Climate change","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=climate-change"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/09bd70e4f-59ac-4510-97ba-0b384814a00a.jpg?fit=1200%2C900&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/09bd70e4f-59ac-4510-97ba-0b384814a00a.jpg?fit=1200%2C900&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/09bd70e4f-59ac-4510-97ba-0b384814a00a.jpg?fit=1200%2C900&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/09bd70e4f-59ac-4510-97ba-0b384814a00a.jpg?fit=1200%2C900&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/09bd70e4f-59ac-4510-97ba-0b384814a00a.jpg?fit=1200%2C900&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":425741,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=425741","url_meta":{"origin":381978,"position":1},"title":"Right, New York Times, Scientists Do Disagree on The Polar Vortex","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"02\/11\/2026","format":false,"excerpt":"A recent article in\u00a0The\u00a0New York Times\u00a0(NYT) \u201cWhat\u2019s Up With This Big Freeze? 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The framing is, at best, misleading and, at worst, flat-out false. Inflation is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Climate change\"","block_context":{"text":"Climate change","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=climate-change"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0NYT-climate-inflation-misleading.jpg?fit=1200%2C857&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0NYT-climate-inflation-misleading.jpg?fit=1200%2C857&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0NYT-climate-inflation-misleading.jpg?fit=1200%2C857&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0NYT-climate-inflation-misleading.jpg?fit=1200%2C857&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0NYT-climate-inflation-misleading.jpg?fit=1200%2C857&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/121246920"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=381978"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381978\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":381987,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381978\/revisions\/381987"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/381986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=381978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=381978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=381978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}