Educational - CAPE

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CAPE is Convective Available Potential Energy.

Basically, it's a measure of the potential energy the atmosphere currently has for generating thunderstorms. The higher the value, the more severe and intense the storms (most of the time).

Values under 1000 usually don't produce storms at all.

Values below 3000 produce storms, but mostly non-severe storms, unless you are talking about the northern states where CAPEs around 3000 can produce severe weather.

Values above 3000 usually indicate the potential for some big storms!