Atmospheric physicists at the University of Toronto say global warming will increase water evaporation from the oceans but will not increase the number of storms per year. Instead, they say it will result in strong storms becoming more intense and weak storms becoming milder. The scientists examined the effects of climate change by picturing the atmosphere as a heat engine that follows the laws of thermodynamics. “Put more simply, powerful storms are strengthened at the expense of weaker storms,” said research associate Frederic Laliberte. “We believe atmospheric circulation will adapt to this less efficient form of heat transfer and we will see either fewer storms overall or at least a weakening of the most common, weaker storms.