One of the most persistent claims in the climate debate is that global warming leads to more extreme weather.

This is a common concern expressed by those who fear a dangerously warming planet.

President Barack Obama did so eloquently in his 2013 state of the Union address when he talked about the devastating impact of raging fires and crippling drought and more powerful storms.

Many others have offered similar sentiments.

Global warming is a problem that needs to be addressed, but exaggeration doesn't help, and often distracts from simple,

cheaper, and smarter solutions.

To find those solutions, let's address the three horsemen of the climate apocalypse to which President Obama referred.

Historical analysis of wildfires around the world shows that since 1950, their numbers have decreased globally by 15%.

Estimates published in the proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows that even with global warming,

the level of wildfires will continue to decline until mid-century and won't resume on the level of 1950, the worst for fire, before the end of the century.

Claiming that droughts are a consequence of global warming is also wrong.

The world has not seen a general increase in drought.

A study published in Nature in March 2014 shows globally that there has been little change in drought over the past 60 years.

The UN climate panel in 2012 concluded,

some regions of the world have experienced more intense and longer droughts in particular in southern Europe and west Africa,

but in some regions droughts have become less frequent, less intense, or shorter, for example in central North America and northwestern Australia.

And finally, the third horsemen, hurricanes.

Global hurricane activity today, measured by total energy, hasn't been lower since the 1970s.

While it's likely that we will see somewhat stronger, but fewer, storms as climate change continues,

damages will be lower because we'll be better adapted.

A March 2012 nature study shows that the global damage costs from hurricanes will be 0.02 percent of gross domestic product by 2100,

down 50 percent from today's 0.04 percent.

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