Biden doubling spending to prepare for hurricanes, storms

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden announced Monday that he's doubling U.S. emergency spending to help communities prepare for hurricanes and other extreme weather events, while launching a new effort at NASA to better understand and track the impact of climate change.

The $1 billion in spending is a small fraction of what the U.S. spends on weather-related disasters. Last year alone, the nation endured 22 weather and climate-related disasters with losses greater than $1 billion each. The disasters, including wildfires, hurricanes and snowstorms, had a cumulative price tag of nearly $100 billion.

2021 has already had significant winter storms that caused a deadly blackout in Texas and other states and underscore the damage caused by climate change.

“We all know that the storms are coming, and we’re going to be prepared," Biden said during a visit to the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Washington headquarters. “We have to be ready.”

Forecasters predict the Atlantic hurricane season will be busier than normal, but is unlikely to be as severe as 2020’s record-shattering year.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said last week that the hurricane season, which runs from June through November, will likely see 13 to 20 named storms, including at least six that will become hurricanes and three to five categorized as major hurricanes with winds of more than 110 mph (177 kilometers per hour).

Biden, during his visit to FEMA, received a briefing on this year’s outlook for the Atlantic hurricane season.

As climate change threatens to bring more extreme events such as increased floods, sea level rise and intensifying droughts and wildfires, the White House said it is the government's responsibility to better prepare and support communities before...