Journal #6 - Will the consesus of forecasters please stand up?

So far, I've gotten 9 responses out of the 20 e-mails I've sent out - 2 of them referred me to other meteorologists who have, as of yet, not responded to me. But, in general, I received a very impressive response. Because of the two part question I’ve asked, I’m going to split my summarization of e-mails into two journal entries – one for ACE, and one for Saffir-Simpson. This entry will have to do with the Saffir-Simpson scale. In general, the response I received was that the meteorologists were against altering the Saffir-Simpson scale. Most of the meteorologists (Prof. Bourassa, Franklin, Prof. Klotzbach,
Prof. Evans, Stewart) all pointed out that the National Hurricane Center recently removed storm surge and pressure from the Saffir-Simpson scale, making the S-S scale simply about top wind speed. Prof. Bourassa stated that while he had a positive reaction towards the new S-S scale, he had not been able to investigate it fully and expressed doubts over the new solution with regards to storm surge. Prof. Emanuel said that he was not a supporter of the S-S scale in its current form, and would prefer to “would reform it by making the scale a strict function of the maximum wind speed over a threshold, raised to some power, allowing for two significant figures (e.g. cat 4.2) and leaving it open ended (e.g. cat 6.1)”. Franklin noted some attempts in recent years to redesign the hurricane scale, and that these attempts usually involved storm size; however, he notes that such scales would most likely only serve to confuse the public (his concern makes sense as a forecaster for the NHC). Prof. Klotzbach noted that the NHC had recently made changes to the S-S scale. Prof. Evans believes we should keep the S-S scale because we’ve been keeping records that way for over 100 years, and that the S-S scale acts as a sort of “comfort” for the public, however, she notes the need for an alternative index. Stewart believes that the S-S scale is fine as is. Aberson recommended I look at a measure entitled Integrated Kinetic Energy of a system as a possible method of using storm size.