alternately attain their maxima. According to Viktor Schauberger,
these oscillations take place at such a high frequency that we can-
not perceive them, and view them as a state of rest.Storms, water vapour and climate
The amount of water evaporated annually from the oceans has been
calculated to total about 333,000km^3.^8 By comparison, the amount
from rivers, lakes and land surfaces is more like in 62,000km^3 , or
18.6% of the world's annual rainfall (395,000km^3 ). This has in the
past been derived mostly from forests. However, the enormous
deforestation of the last fifty years, particularly for agriculture and
beef production, has led to a much higher evaporation rate from the
Sun-exposed land surfaces.
This leads to a higher volume of water vapour in the atmos-
phere, which in turn increases the greenhouse effect, leading to
higher temperatures which produce a further increase in evapora-
tion from the oceans.^9 There is one feedback mechanism which alle-
viates the increase in surface temperature; this is the increase in
cloud cover as a result of the increased water vapour, increasing the
reflection of the Sun's energy back into space (the albedo effect).
While this additional water vapour will increase the general
atmospheric temperatures, much of it will drift towards the poles
due to the movement of the upper air streams, there to fall as snow,
adding to the volume of water fixed almost permanently as ice. This
abnormal water vapour content increases the amount of cloud
cover, increasing the albedo effect by which the Sun's energy is
reflected back into space from the clouds' surface.^10
The catastrophic rainfall in some areas like Bangladesh and
Mozambique and the severe drought conditions of central Africa
and northern China are the result of this serious disturbance of the
Earth's water balance. Man's destruction of the forest starts a chain
reaction that precipitates the cumulative effects of an increasingly
disrupted world climate.
- THE ATMOSPHERE AND ELECTRICITY