9th May 2016
The amount of energy released by a hurricane
An average hurricane bringing in 1.5 cm per day of rain, with a circle radius of 665 km, generates a huge amount of energy (6.0 × 1014 Watts or 5.2 × 1019 Joules/ day), which is equivalent of 200 times the electricity-generating capacity of the entire planet in a year. This is equivalent to detonating a ten megaton nuclear bomb every 20 minutes. In 10 minutes a hurricane releases more energy than all of the world’s nuclear weapons combined.
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