Major cities such as Philadelphia and New York could experience major power outages if climate changes continue, a new study says.

Johns Hopkins University released an analysis stating that climate change is likely to increase the severity of future storms because of a range of factors such as higher precipitation, flooding, high winds, sea level rise and more. All these pose a threat to electrical grids across the United States.

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The team of researchers used a computer model to predict the increasing vulnerability to hurricanes of power grids in major cities in cities relatively near the Atlantic and Gulf coasts.

The data they gathered identified 27 cities that could be prone to blackouts because of future hurricanes.

The list of cities include New York, Philadelphia, Jacksonville, Florida; Virginia Beach, Virginia; and Hartford, Connecticut.

Seth Guikema, an associate professor at the university's Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering, said his team's analysis could help metropolitan areas better plan for climate change.

The team also evaluated a range of potential changes in hurricane activity and measured how those changes are likely to influence power outage risk. The possibility of anticipating these risks gives officials a chance to protect cities against damage and to strengthen their power grids, he added.

"We provide insight into how power systems along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts may be affected by climate changes, including which areas should be most concerned and which ones are unlikely to see substantial change.

"If I'm mayor of Miami, we know about hurricanes, we know about outages and our system has been adapted for it. But if I'm mayor of Philadelphia, I might say, 'Whoa; we need to be doing more about this," Guikema said.

The new research was published in the latest issue of the journal, Climatic Change.

Tagspower outage, blackout, Philadelphia, Virginia. hurricanes