|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
World Will Not Meet 2C Warming Target
 Wed Apr 15, 2009 4:24 am
|
 |
|
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/04/14
World Will Not Meet 2C Warming Target, Climate Change Experts Agree
Guardian poll reveals almost nine out of 10 climate experts do not believe current political efforts will keep warming below 2C
by David Adam
Almost nine out of 10 climate scientists do not believe political efforts to restrict global warming to 2C will succeed, a Guardian poll reveals today. An average rise of 4-5C by the end of this century is more likely, they say, given soaring carbon emissions and political constraints.
Such a change would disrupt food and water supplies, exterminate thousands of species of plants and animals and trigger massive sea level rises that would swamp the homes of hundreds of millions of people.
The poll of those who follow global warming most closely exposes a widening gulf between political rhetoric and scientific opinions on climate change. While policymakers and campaigners focus on the 2C target, 86% of the experts told the survey they did not think it would be achieved. A continued focus on an unrealistic 2C rise, which the EU defines as dangerous, could even undermine essential efforts to adapt to inevitable higher temperature rises in the coming decades, they warned.
The survey follows a scientific conference last month in Copenhagen, where a series of studies were presented that suggested global warming could strike harder and faster than realised.
The Guardian contacted all 1,756 people who registered to attend the conference and asked for their opinions on the likely course of global warming. Of 261 experts who responded, 200 were researchers in climate science and related fields. The rest were drawn from industry or worked in areas such as economics and social and political science.
The 261 respondents represented 26 countries and included dozens of senior figures, including laboratory directors, heads of university departments and authors of the 2007 report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
The poll asked the experts whether the 2C target could still be achieved, and whether they thought that it would be met: 60% of respondents argued that, in theory, it was still technically and economically possible to meet the target, which represents an average global warming of 2C since the industrial revolution. The world has already warmed by about 0.8C since then, and another 0.5C or so is inevitable over coming decades given past greenhouse gas emissions. But 39% said the 2C target was impossible.
The poll comes as UN negotiations to agree a new global treaty to regulate carbon pollution gather pace in advance of a key meeting in Copenhagen in December. Officials will try to agree a successor to the Kyoto protocol, the first phase of which expires in 2012. The 2C target is unlikely to feature in a new treaty, but most of the carbon cuts proposed for rich countries are based on it. Bob Watson, chief scientist to Defra, told the Guardian last year that the world needed to focus on the 2C target, but should also prepare for a possible 4C rise.
Asked what temperature rise was most likely, 84 of the 182 specialists (46%) who answered the question said it would reach 3-4C by the end of the century; 47 (26%) suggested a rise of 2-3C, while a handful said 6C or more. While 24 experts predicted a catastrophic rise of 4-5C, just 18 thought it would stay at 2C or under.
Some of those surveyed who said the 2C target would be met confessed they did so more out of hope rather than belief. "As a mother of young children I choose to believe this, and work hard toward it," one said.
"This optimism is not primarily due to scientific facts, but to hope," said another. Some said they thought geoengineering measures, such as seeding the ocean with iron to encourage plankton growth, would help meet the target.
Many of the experts stressed that an inability to hit the 2C target did not mean that efforts to tackle global warming should be abandoned, but that the emphasis is now on damage limitation. |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| Q+A: How great is the threat from melting ice sheets?
Tue Apr 21, 2009 1:23 am
|
|
|
http://uk.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUKTRE53G3H820090417?pageNumber=2&virtualBrandChannel=0
Q+A: How great is the threat from melting ice sheets?
(Reuters) - The U.N. Climate Panel says seas could rise by 18-59 cms (7-24 inches) by 2100, without taking account the possible acceleration of a melt of ice sheets in Antarctica or Greenland.
Even a small thaw of Antarctica and Greenland would affect sea levels since together they lock up enough ice to raise sea levels by about 65 meters (215 feet) if they all melted.
Following are responses to questions from Reuters by a leading glaciologist as part of an ad-hoc global series of top climate change scientists, policy makers and academics.
Ian Allison is leader of the Australian Antarctic Division's Ice, Ocean, Atmosphere and Climate program and a researcher within the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Center.
He has been involved in Antarctic science for over 40 years.
HOW GREAT IS THE THREAT FROM ICE SHEETS MELTING?
"I think it is now unequivocal that warming of the world is occurring and I think the last IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) conclusively showed that a major cause of warming is greenhouse gas emissions from mankind.
We now know that the ice sheets are contributing to sea level rise and for the Arctic, at least, this is because the warming of this region is much greater than in other places on Earth.
We also know that glaciers in mountain areas are undergoing a very rapid retreat and they're a major contributor of sea level rise, too.
WHICH IS OF MORE CONCERN? GREENLAND OR WEST ANTARCTICA?
"Greenland is of more concern because of the warming of the Arctic. Greenland is at lower latitude than much of Antarctica and we've seen the direct effect of the melting.
We still don't understand many things about the dynamic response of the ice sheets but we do see direct melt exceeding snowfall in Greenland.
This might not mean a runaway effect but it does mean Greenland is contributing to sea level rise and will continue to add to sea levels at the present temperatures for many hundreds of years."
EXPLAIN THE THREAT FROM WEST ANTARCTICA
"Ice shelves and floating ice tongues can buttress the flow of grounded ice from the interior of the ice sheets. We've seen examples in both Greenland and Antarctica of floating ice disappearing, and the ice that sits on the land then flowing more quickly into the ocean.
"In addition, the West Antarctic may be inherently unstable. The West Antarctic forms what is called the marine ice shelf. The ice is resting on bedrock but that bedrock is below sea level. It's like if you load too many ice cubes in your gin and tonic, the bottom one touches the bottom of the glass even though it's well below the water level.
Where the bedrock under a marine ice sheet slopes down toward the interior, such as under parts of West Antarctica, the ice sheet may be unstable. If it thins, it will start to float at the edges, becoming an ice shelf.
For a bedrock that slopes backwards and becomes deeper further in, continued retreat of the grounded ice sheet may proceed very rapidly. A small retreat could in theory destabilize the entire West Antarctica ice sheet, leading to rapid disintegration."
WHAT ARE THE MAIN GAPS IN OUR KNOWLEDGE?
"There two areas. One, we need to improve our mathematical models of ice streams, ice sheets and ice shelves to be able to better project future changes. We also need more detailed measurements of how deep the bedrock is under the ice sheets to use in the models.
The other major gap in our understanding is what is happening at the bed of the ice sheets; how they react with liquid water at the base, what role water may have in sliding processes and the role of gravels and slurry at the base.
We now know there is a lot of liquid water under the ice sheets. But we don't really know how changes in this may affect the ice flow. Knowing what's under the ice sheets we really need to measure that with radar systems."
WHAT ARE YOUR MAIN MESSAGES TO POLICY MAKERS?
"The main thing is monitoring what's actually happening with sea level rise and the ice sheets. We've now got tools that can do that, we can improve those and make sure they keep going, particularly satellite-based systems.
We need better predictive tools to know just what is likely in the next 100 years. I don't think we should be rushing into building up coastal defenses until we know what we could be defending against. So our biggest requirement is to be able to refine our projections for what may happen in the future."
(Editing by David Fox) |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| World's major rivers 'drying up'
Wed Apr 22, 2009 12:14 am
|
|
|
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8011497.stm
World's major rivers 'drying up'
By Matt McGrath
BBC's environment reporter
Water levels in some of the world's most important rivers have declined significantly over the past 50 years, US researchers say.
They say the reduced flows are linked to climate change and will have a major impact as the human population grows.
The only area with a significant increase in water flows was the Arctic due to a greater snow and ice melting.
The study was published in the American Meteorological Society's (AMS) Journal of Climate.
Rainfall patterns 'altered'
From the Yellow river in northern China to the Ganges in India to the Colorado river in the United States - the US scientists say that the major sources of fresh water for much of the world's population are in decline.
The researchers analysed water flows in more than 900 rivers over a 50-year period to 2004.
They found that there was an overall decline in the amount of water flowing into the world's oceans.
Much of the reduction has been caused by human activities such as the building of dams and the diversion of water for agriculture.
But the researchers highlighted the contribution of climate change, saying that rising temperatures were altering rainfall patterns and increasing rates of evaporation.
The authors say they are concerned that the decline in freshwater sources will continue with serious repercussions for a growing global population.
While some major rivers, including the Brahmaputra in South Asia and the Yangtze in China, have larger water flows, there is concern that the increased volume comes from the melting of glaciers in the Himalayas.
This means that in future these rivers might decline significantly as the glaciers disappear.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/8011497.stm |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| West Is Told to Expect Water Shortfalls
Wed Apr 22, 2009 12:27 am
|
|
|
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/21/science/21obriver.html?_r=1&partner=MYWAY
West Is Told to Expect Water Shortfalls
By HENRY FOUNTAIN
The Colorado River is a critical source of water for seven Western states, each of which gets an annual allotment according to a system that has sparked conflict and controversy for decades. But in an era of climate change, even greater difficulties loom.
The scope of those potential problems is detailed in a study being published in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Tim P. Barnett and David W. Pierce of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography report that under various forecasts of the effects of warming temperatures on runoff into the Colorado, scheduled future water deliveries to the seven states are not sustainable.
The work builds on an earlier study by the researchers that looked at whether Lake Mead, the huge reservoir behind Hoover Dam, would eventually go dry. For the current study, they tweaked their model of river inflows and outflows and looked at the delivery shortfalls that would be needed to keep Lake Mead at the lowest functioning level. The modifications in the model “didn’t really change any of our answers,” Dr. Barnett said. “It just made the study a lot stronger.”
The study found that, with a 20 percent reduction in runoff, by 2050 nearly 9 of every 10 scheduled deliveries would be missed. But the problem may be even worse, because the allotments were determined in the 20th century, when, according to tree-ring data, the region was wetter than normal. So if drier conditions persist, delivery shortfalls will be even greater.
Water deliveries would have to be reduced, something that is achievable through conservation, water reuse and other measures. “We are hopeful that this would serve to get people to sit down now and see what options look realistic,” Dr. Barnett said, “before you have a crisis on your hands.” |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| 'Quiet Sun' baffling astronomers
Wed Apr 22, 2009 5:42 am
|
|
|
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8008473.stm
'Quiet Sun' baffling astronomers
By Pallab Ghosh
Science correspondent, BBC News
The Sun is the dimmest it has been for nearly a century.
There are no sunspots, very few solar flares - and our nearest star is the quietest it has been for a very long time.
The observations are baffling astronomers, who are due to study new pictures of the Sun, taken from space, at the UK National Astronomy Meeting.
The Sun normally undergoes an 11-year cycle of activity. At its peak, it has a tumultuous boiling atmosphere that spits out flares and planet-sized chunks of super-hot gas. This is followed by a calmer period.
Last year, it was expected that it would have been hotting up after a quiet spell. But instead it hit a 50-year year low in solar wind pressure, a 55-year low in radio emissions, and a 100-year low in sunspot activity.
According to Prof Louise Hara of University College London, it is unclear why this is happening or when the Sun is likely to become more active again.
"There's no sign of us coming out of it yet," she told BBC News.
"At the moment, there are scientific papers coming out suggesting that we'll be going into a normal period of activity soon.
"Others are suggesting we'll be going into another minimum period - this is a big scientific debate at the moment."
In the mid-17th Century, a quiet spell - known as the Maunder Minimum - lasted 70 years, and led to a "mini ice-age".
This has resulted in some people suggesting that a similar cooling might offset the impact of climate change.
According to Prof Mike Lockwood of Southampton University, this view is too simplistic.
"I wish the Sun was coming to our aid but, unfortunately, the data shows that is not the case," he said.
Prof Lockwood was one of the first researchers to show that the Sun's activity has been gradually decreasing since 1985, yet overall global temperatures have continued to rise.
"If you look carefully at the observations, it's pretty clear that the underlying level of the Sun peaked at about 1985 and what we are seeing is a continuation of a downward trend (in solar activity) that's been going on for a couple of decades.
"If the Sun's dimming were to have a cooling effect, we'd have seen it by now."
'Middle ground'
Evidence from tree trunks and ice cores suggest that the Sun is calming down after an unusually high point in its activity.
Professor Lockwood believes that as well as the Sun's 11-year cycle, there is an underlying solar oscillation lasting hundreds of years.
He suggests that 1985 marked the "grand maximum" in this long-term cycle and the Maunder Minimum marked its low point.
"We are re-entering the middle ground after a period which has seen the Sun in its top 10% of activity," said Professor Lockwood.
"We would expect it to be more than a hundred years before we get down to the levels of the Maunder Minimum."
He added that the current slight dimming of the Sun is not going to reverse the rise in global temperatures caused by the burning of fossil fuels.
"What we are seeing is consistent with a global temperature rise, not that the Sun is coming to our aid."
Data from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) shows global average temperatures have risen by about 0.7C since the beginning of the 20th Century.
And the IPCC projects that the world will continue to warm, with temperatures expected to rise between 1.8C and 4C by the end of the century.
No-one knows how the centuries-long waxing and waning of the Sun works. However, astronomers now have space telescopes studying the Sun in detail.
According to Prof Richard Harrison of the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Oxfordshire, this current quiet period gives astronomers a unique opportunity.
"This is very exciting because as astronomers we've never seen anything like this before in our lifetimes," he said.
"We have spacecraft up there to study the Sun in phenomenal detail. With these telescopes we can study this minimum of activity in a way that we could not have done so in the past."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/8008473.stm
[/b] |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| Arctic CO2 levels growing at an 'unprecedented rate'
Tue Apr 28, 2009 4:38 am
|
|
|
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/apr/27/arctic-carbon-dioxide-levels
Arctic CO2 levels growing at an 'unprecedented rate'
Figures from a measuring station in northern Norway show that CO2 levels are increasing by 2-3 parts per million every year
John Vidal in Ny Alesund, Svalbard
guardian.co.uk,
The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has reached a record high, according to the latest figures released by an internationally regarded measuring station in the Arctic.
The measurements suggest that the main greenhouse gas is continuing to increase in the atmosphere at an alarming rate despite the downturn in dip in the rate of increase of the global economy.
Levels of the gas at the Zeppelin research station on Svalbard, northern Norway, last week peaked at over 397 parts per million (ppm), an increase of more than 2.5ppm on 2008. They have since begun to reduce and today stand at 393.7ppm. Prior to the industrial revolution, CO2 levels were around 280ppm.
CO2 levels recorded in Svalbard tend to be higher than the global average, but scientists said the CO2 level they had measured was unprecedented even for that location. "These are the highest figures collected in 50m years," said Johan Strom, professor of atmospheric physics at the government-funded Norwegian Polar Institute, which collected the data.
"It is not the level of CO2 that is the problem, because the earth will adapt. What is very worrying is the speed of change. Levels [here] are now increasing 2-3ppm a year.
"The rate of increase is much faster than only 10-20 years ago. You can almost see the changes taking place. Never before have CO2 levels increased so fast," he said.
The global annual mean growth rate for 2007 was 2.14ppm – the fourth year in the past six to see an annual rise greater than 2ppm. From 1970 to 2000, the concentration rose by about 1.5ppm each year, but since 2000 it has risen to an average 2.1ppm.
"There can be week-to-week or day-to-day variability," said Thomas Conway, research chemist at US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Earth Systems research lab in Boulder, Colorado. But he said a 2.5ppm annual increase was "on the high end".
"This is part of an overall pattern of CO2 increasing in the atmosphere. Unless the burning of fossil fuels decreases, then the CO2 will not decrease. And if the rate of fossil fuel burning increases, so will the rate of CO2 increases," he added.
"These are quite large numbers. It sounds like this is an Arctic phenomenon," said Dr Vicky Pope, head of climate change advice at the Met Office Hadley Centre in Exeter. "It fits with the general increase in emissions. You would expect the concentrations of CO2 to grow."
Last week, NOAA released preliminary figures for its annual greenhouse gas index, which incorporates data from 60 sites around the world – including Zeppelin. Total global CO2 concentration topped 386ppm. In 2008 the global average increased by 2.1ppm, slightly less than the 2.2ppm increase in 2007. NOAA's primary CO2 measurement station is Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii.
CO2 levels are typically higher in the Arctic than the global average because there is more landmass and human activity in the northern hemisphere. As a result, human emissions from factories and transport tend to lead to higher CO2 levels here.
The figures will concern policy-makers ahead of global talks on a successor to the Kyoto Protocol in December. Climate scientists advise that the world must prevent CO2 levels from rising higher than around 450ppm CO2 equivalent (a measure of global warming potential that incorporates other gasses such as methane and is higher than the measured CO2 levels) to avoid a 2C increase on preindustrial global average temperature.
The Zeppelin research station is situated on a mountain top approximately 1100km from the North Pole. The closest town, Ny Alesund, is the northernmost human settlement in the world, mainly inhabited by research scientists. Although the research station is far from major sources of human pollution, atmospheric circulation brings air from Europe and North America into the Arctic region.
"There is less human influence here and most of the pollution comes straight here at this time of the year. From now on levels will reduce until the end of August when they will pick back up," said Strom.
"It is clearly the effect of human activity. Even if we stopped emitting now, we would have to live with this ... we will have to live with it for thousands of years, but that does not mean we should do nothing."
The figures come as Al Gore hosts a conference in Tromso, northern Norway, on melting arctic ice. Last week he told the US senate committee on energy and commerce that the arctic is now melting at an "unprecedented" rate.
"The most recent 11 summers have all experienced melting greater than the average 35 year time series," he said.
He is expected to warn ministers in polar regions that the arctic ice cap may totally disappear in as little as five years if nothing is done to curb greenhouse emissions.
Earlier this month, US scientists reported that annually forming sea in the Arctic region covered roughly the same area as in previous years, but had significantly thinned. |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| NASA Study Links Severe Storm Increases, Global Warming
Fri May 08, 2009 5:27 am
|
|
|
http://elitestv.com/pub/2009/05/nasa-study-links-severe-storm-increases-global-warming
NASA Study Links Severe Storm Increases, Global Warming
PASADENA, Calif. — The frequency of extremely high clouds in Earth’s tropics — the type associated with severe storms and rainfall — is increasing as a result of global warming, according to a study by scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
In a presentation today to the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco, JPL Senior Research Scientist Hartmut Aumann outlined the results of a study based on five years of data from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument on NASA’s Aqua spacecraft. The AIRS data were used to observe certain types of tropical clouds linked with severe storms, torrential rain and hail. The instrument typically detects about 6,000 of these clouds each day. Aumann and his team found a strong correlation between the frequency of these clouds and seasonal variations in the average sea surface temperature of the tropical oceans.
For every degree Centigrade (1.8 degrees Fahrenheit) increase in average ocean surface temperature, the team observed a 45-percent increase in the frequency of the very high clouds. At the present rate of global warming of 0.13 degrees Celsius (0.23 degrees Fahrenheit) per decade, the team inferred the frequency of these storms can be expected to increase by six percent per decade.
Climate modelers have long speculated that the frequency and intensity of severe storms may or may not increase with global warming. Aumann said results of the study will help improve their models.
“Clouds and rain have been the weakest link in climate prediction,” said Aumann. “The interaction between the daytime warming of the sea surface under clear-sky conditions and increases in the formation of low clouds, high clouds and, ultimately, rain is very complicated. The high clouds in our observations—typically at altitudes of 20 kilometers (12 miles) and higher—present the greatest difficulties for current climate models, which aren’t able to resolve cloud structures smaller than about 250 kilometers (155 miles) in size.”
Aumann said the results of his study, published recently in Geophysical Research Letters, are consistent with another NASA-funded study by Frank Wentz and colleagues in 2005. That study found an increase in the global rain rate of 1.5 percent per decade over 18 years, a value that is about five times higher than the value estimated by climate models that were used in the 2007 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
JPL manages the AIRS project for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Washington. For more information on AIRS, visit http://airs.jpl.nasa.gov/ .
JPL is managed for NASA by the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Media contacts: Alan Buis 818-354-0474
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
alan.buis@jpl.nasa.gov
2008-242
Source: JPL/NASA: NASA Study Links Severe Storm Increases, Global Warming |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| Global Warming, Human Illness and Loss of Life
Sun May 10, 2009 2:55 am
|
|
|
http://www.healthnewsdigest.com/news/Environment_380/Global_Warming_Human_Illness_and_Loss_of_Life.shtml
Global Warming, Human Illness and Loss of Life
HealthNewsDigest.com) - Researchers believe that global warming is already responsible for some 150,000 deaths each year around the world, and fear that the number may well double by 2030 even if we start getting serious about emissions reductions today.
A team of health and climate scientists from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the University of Wisconsin at Madison published these findings last year in the prestigious, peer-reviewed science journal Nature. Besides killing people, global warming also contributes to some five million human illnesses every year, the researchers found. Some of the ways global warming negatively affects human health—especially in developing nations—include: speeding the spread of infectious diseases such as malaria and dengue fever; creating conditions that lead to potentially fatal malnutrition and diarrhea; and increasing the frequency and severity of heat waves, floods and other weather-related disasters.
Backing up WHO’s findings is a study by Stanford civil and environmental engineer, Mark Jacobson, showing a direct link between rising levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere and increased human mortality. He found that the added air pollution caused by each degree Celsius increase in temperature caused by CO2 leads to about 1,000 additional deaths in the U.S. and many more cases of respiratory illness and asthma. Jacobson estimates as many as 20,000 air-pollution related deaths may occur worldwide each year with each one degree Celsius increase.
“This is a cause and effect relationship, not just a correlation,” relates Jacobson. “The study was the first to specifically isolate CO2’s effect from that of other global-warming agents and to find quantitatively that chemical and meteorological changes due to CO2 itself increase mortality due to increased ozone, particles and carcinogens in the air.”
For their part, though, global warming skeptics such as atmospheric physicist Fred Singer maintain that cold weather snaps are responsible for more human deaths than warm temperatures and heat waves. “The elderly die in inadequately heated homes. People get skull fractures from falls on the ice. Men die of heart attacks while shoveling snow. People get colds, flu, pneumonia and other respiratory diseases. Infectious diseases proliferate. Hospital admissions rise.” Singer, founder of the Science and Environmental Policy Project, concludes that since global warming would raise maximum summer temperatures modestly while raising winter minimum temperatures significantly, it “should help reduce human death rates.”
A team of Harvard researchers found otherwise. Their July 2007 study, published in the peer-reviewed Occupational and Environment Medicine, found that global warming is likely to cause more deaths in summer because of higher temperatures, but not fewer deaths in milder winters. In analyzing weather data related to the deaths of 6.5 million people in 50 American cities between 1989 and 2000, the researchers found that during two-day cold snaps there was a 1.59 percent increase in deaths because of the extreme temperatures. But in similar periods of extremely hot weather, mortality rates increased 5.74 percent.
CONTACTS: WHO, www.who.int ; Science and Environmental Policy Project, www.sepp.org.
SEND YOUR ENVIRONMENTAL QUESTIONS TO: EarthTalk, P.O. Box 5098, Westport, CT 06881; earthtalk@emagazine.com. Read past columns at: www.emagazine.com/earthtalk/archives.php. EarthTalk is now a book! Details and order information at: www.emagazine.com/earthtalkbook. |
| |
|
|
mr. jones
Joined: 03 Mar 2006
Posts: 1899
|
|
Mon May 11, 2009 6:40 pm
|
|
|
The quiet of the sun at the moment might have something to do with planet x approaching our solar system,
but that scenario is off limits to investigative astronomy.
_________________
"The whole aim of practical politics is
to keep the populace alarmed, and thus clamorous to be led to safety, by menacing it with an endless series of
hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| Key coral reefs 'could disappear'
Fri May 15, 2009 11:24 pm
|
|
|
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8047138.stm
Key coral reefs 'could disappear'
By Lucy Williamson
BBC News, Manado, Indonesia
The world's most important coral region is in danger of being wiped out by the end of this century unless fast action is taken, says a new report.
The international conservation group WWF warns that 40% of reefs in the Coral Triangle have already been lost.
The area is shared between Indonesia and five other South East Asian nations and is thought to contain 75% of the world's coral species.
It is likened to the Amazon rainforest in terms of its biodiversity.
Temperature change
The WWF report paints a bleak picture. If the world's richest coral reef is destroyed, the fish that people rely on for food could be gone.
By the end of the century, 100 million people across South East Asia could be on the march, looking for something to eat. Communities might be breaking down and economies destroyed.
It's billed as a worst-case scenario, but the report's chief author, Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, says it is not as bad as the future we're currently headed towards.
"Up until now we haven't realized how quickly this system is changing," says Professor Hoegh-Guldberg.
"In the last 40 years in the Coral Triangle, we've lost 40% of coral reefs and mangroves - and that's probably an underestimate. We've fundamentally changed the way the planet works in terms of currents and this is only with a 0.7 degree change in terms of temperature.
"What's going to happen when we exceed two or four or six?"
Climate change consequences
Avoiding a worst-case scenario would need significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and better controls on fishing and coastal areas, says the report.
The Coral Triangle covers 1% of the earth's surface but contains a third of all the world's coral, and three-quarters of its coral reef species.
If it goes, an entire eco-system goes with it - and that, says Prof Hoegh-Gudberg, has serious consequences for its ability to tackle climate change.
"Pollution, the inappropriate use of coastal areas, these are destroying the productivity of ocean which is plummeting right now. That is the system that traps CO2 - 40% of CO2 goes into the ocean.
"Now if we interrupt that, the problems on planet earth become even greater," says Prof Hoegh-Gudberg.
Indonesia is hosting the World Ocean Conference this week because, it says, oceans have been neglected so far in global discussions on climate change.
It wants the issue to have a bigger profile at UN climate talks later this year.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/8047138.stm
[/b] |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| Global warming could be twice as bad as forecast
Fri May 22, 2009 5:54 am
|
|
|
http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN19448608
Global warming could be twice as bad as forecast
WASHINGTON, May 19 (Reuters) - Global warming's effects this century could be twice as extreme as estimated just six years ago, scientists reported on Tuesday.
Earth's median surface temperature could rise 9.3 degrees F (5.2 degrees C) by 2100, the scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found, compared to a 2003 study that projected a median temperature increase of 4.3 degrees F (2.4 degrees C).
The new study, published in the American Meteorological Society's Journal of Climate, said the difference in projection was due to improved economic modeling and newer economic data than in previous scenarios.
Earlier climate warming may also have been masked by the global cooling effect of 20th-century volcanoes and by the emission of soot, which can add to warming, the scientists said in a statement.
To reach their conclusions, the MIT team used computer simulations that took world economic activity as well as climate processes into account, they said in a statement.
These projections indicate that "without rapid and massive action," this dramatic warming will take place this century, the statement said.
The outcome looks much worse if nothing is done to combat climate change, compared to earlier projections. But there is less change if strong policies are put in place now to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
Without action, said study co-author Ronald Prinn, "there is significantly more risk than we previously estimated. This increases the urgency for significant policy action."
The study was released as U.S. President Barack Obama announced a plan to set national emissions standards for cars and trucks to cut climate-warming pollution [nN19374415] and as a bill to institute a cap-and-trade system to curb greenhouse gases was debated in the House Energy and Commerce Committee. [nN19402140]
[/b] |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| Global warming of 7C 'could kill billions this century'
Fri May 22, 2009 6:00 am
|
|
|
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/5357725/Global-warming-of-7C-could-kill-billions-this-century.html
Global warming of 7C 'could kill billions this century'
Global temperatures could rise by more than 7C this century killing billions of people and leaving the world on the brink of total collapse, according to new research.
By Louise Gray, Environment Correspondent
Last Updated: 10:48PM BST 20 May 2009
The study, carried out in unprecedented detail, projected that without "rapid and massive action" temperatures worldwide will increase by as much as 7.4C (13.3F) by 2100, from levels seen in 2000.
Previous estimates have concluded that the likely increase this century would probably be 2.4C (4.3F).
However the new study by scientists at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology included projected economic growth in developing countries and new information on the affect increased carbon emissions will have on biological processes, such as the capacity of the ocean to absorb greenhouse gases.
The results are based on 400 trials of the new system, each time using slightly different variations in data at the start to try and iron out errors.
Study co-author Ronald Prinn, Professor of Atmospheric Chemistry and director of MIT's Centre for Global Climate Change, said all the results resulted in an increase in temperatures.
The projections average out at a likely Earth temperature increase of 5.2C (9.4F) this century, and conclude there is a 90 per cent chance the temperature change will be between 3.5C and 7.4C (6.3F and 13.3F).
"Overall they stacked up so they caused more projected global warming. There is significantly more risk than we previously expected," he said.
"This increases the urgency for significant policy action. There is no way the world can and should take these risks."
Friends of the Earth climate campaigner Tom Picken said that if the new research by MIT is accurate the results for the planet would be catastrophic.
He called for the world to try and reduce the chance of such an increase in temperatures by committing to reduce carbon emissions at the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen at the end of this year.
"The consequences of such changes would be off the known scale. They are unthinkable," he said
"A 7.4C rise would mean severe ecosystem collapse worldwide, with total economic collapse in many parts of the world.
"The planet would face resource wars between people, and you can safely say many, many hundred of millions of people would die," he said. |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| Global warming study: US has already started changing
Wed Jun 17, 2009 12:18 am
|
|
|
http://www.boston.com/news/politics/politicalintelligence/2009/06/global_warming.html
Global warming study: US has already started changing
WASHINGTON -- A new government study of global warming confirms that climate change caused by carbon dioxide is already having a "visible impact" on the United States, and severe problems are on the way -- including longer droughts, more floods and an increase in pests like mosquitoes -- if global warming continues unchecked.
The report by the Global Change Research Project, a consortium of government agencies like the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency, also directly links climate change to carbon dioxide generated by humans, and warns that severe environmental problems, from coastal flooding to a rise in diseases threatening the human food chain, will only get worse.
"This new report integrates the most up-to-date scientific findings into a comprehensive picture of the ongoing as well as expected future impacts of heat-trapping pollution on the climate experienced by Americans," said John P. Holdren, Assisstant to the President for Science and Technology and director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.
"It tells us why remedial action is needed sooner rather than later, as well as showing why that action must include both global emissions reductions to reduce the extent of climate change and local adaptation measures to reduce the damage from the changes that are no longer avoidable."
In light of the report, Representative Edward J. Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat and chairman of the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, announced he would hold a series of “impact hearings” on the conclusions the study has reached. The first hearing will be held this Thursday on the impacts of a warming world on America’s agriculture and forests
"This report reinforces the science, renews our dedication to forging a national solution, and relegates the last bastions of climate denial to the dustbin of history,” Markey said in a statement issued yesterday. “We waited for eight years to take any action on global warming, even as the evidence mounted. Our economy, our environment, and our planet can wait no longer."
According to the study, temperatures in the United States have already risen 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit since 1900, and the farming season now starts two weeks earlier. In addition, heavy downpours in the last 50 years have increased 67 percent in the Northeast and 31 percent in the Midwest, triggering record floods.
If climate change is not seriously addressed, according to the report, temperatures worldwide could increase 11 degrees Fahrenheit, with even greater overall increases in the United States, and heat waves will be more prolonged and intense. The higher temperatures will increase the number of pests like mosquitoes, weeds will grow faster, and diseases will threaten livestock and agriculture as well as human health.
At the same time, according to the report, droughts will last longer, competition for resources will increase and the nation's coastal area will be threatened due to rising sea levels and more powerful storm surges during hurricanes and other extremely violent weather. By the year 2100, the report predicts, Cape Canaveral and the Everglades, two Florida landmarks, could be completely submerged.
The answer, according to the report, is twofold: take immediate action to curb production of carbon dioxide and come up with ways to cope with -- or take advantage of -- the changes that will likely occur.
"Both of these are necessary elements of an effective response strategy," said Jerry Melillo of the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass., who co-chaired the report.
read the full report here: http://www.globalchange.gov/publications/reports/scientific-assessments/us-impacts |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| How aerosols mask climate change
Sat Jun 20, 2009 4:12 am
|
|
|
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8108100.stm
How aerosols mask climate change
By Victoria Gill
Science reporter, BBC News
A Norwegian scientist says he has shown how much aerosols influence climate.
Aerosol particles scatter and reflect the Sun's rays - an effect that "masks" global warming.
This study aimed to bring together models and observations of this "direct aerosol effect", to accurately estimate the magnitude of this cooling.
Reporting in the journal Science, climate scientist Gunnar Myhre has found that the effect is weaker than previous studies have estimated.
Dr Myhre, from the Center for International Climate and Environmental Research in Oslo, said this clarifies just how much humans have changed the climate so far.
The pollution particles he studied include industrial aerosols such as sulphates, nitrates found in smoke from burning agricultural waste and black carbon (soot) from diesel engines and other forms of combustion.
"Global models of the emission of these aerosols suggest the cooling effect they have cancels out approximately 10% of the global warming caused by greenhouse gases," explained Jim Haywood, an aerosol researcher from the UK Met Office, who was not involved in this study.
"But satellite methods that detect the amount of aerosols in the atmosphere suggest a cooling effect that cancels out about 20%."
By identifying the source of this discrepancy, Dr Myhre was able to reconcile the two approaches and come up with a more precise estimate - closer to 10%.
This suggests the effect is weaker than the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has estimated.
"Sulphate and organic carbon scatter solar radiation, whereas black carbon, to a large degree, absorbs it," he explained.
"The models take into account that black carbon [emissions] have increased more than the other types of aerosol.
"But this has been difficult to take into account in the observational-based method since we have only observations of the current situation, and not before human activity started."
Dr Haywood praised the research. "Until the publication of this paper, us aerosol researchers have been scratching our heads trying to understand the difference between model-based and observational-based assessments," he said.
"This will have an impact on future climate predictions."
Engineering clouds
But aerosols have not yet revealed all of their climate-influencing secrets.
The particles also modify clouds, increasing the concentration of droplets, and therefore cloud-cover.
Dr Myhre said there was "still a lot of uncertainty about the masking or cooling" caused by this "indirect aerosol effect".
Dr Haywood agreed. "The effect of aerosols on clouds gives us a big headache," he told BBC News. "It creates a big hole in our data-gathering."
He and and his colleagues at the Met Office have already started investigating whether aerosols could be employed to deliberately mask global warming.
In a recent study, he used a climate model to find out what effect the deliberate brightening of clouds, by adding sea-salt particles to increase their reflectivity, would have on global temperatures.
The research team, led by fellow Met Office scientist Dr Andy Jones, found that global warming could be slowed by up to 25 years, but they also found the approach could also have some very detrimental effects.
The most serious of these, they say, is a sharp decrease in rainfall over South America, which would likely accelerate the die-back of the Amazon rainforest, and contribute to the loss of one of the world's major carbon sinks.
"You would have to be very careful about which clouds you choose with this approach," said Dr Haywood.
Dr Myhre stated that the impact of aerosols on the climate would eventually become insignificant, compared to greenhouse gases.
"Aerosols have a very short lifetime and the greenhouse gases have a very long lifetime - more than 100 years for carbon dioxide," he said.
"In the future it's really the greenhouse gases that are the big issue for warming. They will dominate more and more."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/8108100.stm
[/b] |
| |
|
|
Sore Throat
Joined: 01 Sep 2000
Posts: 1798
Location: x |
| Climate Change 'Will Cause Civilization to Collapse'
Tue Jul 14, 2009 4:55 am
|
|
|
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/07/13-0
The Planet's Future: Climate Change 'Will Cause Civilization to Collapse'
Authoritative new study sets out a grim vision of shortages and violence – but amid all the gloom, there is some hope too
by Jonathan Owen
Published on Monday, July 13, 2009 by The Independent/UK
An effort on the scale of the Apollo mission that sent men to the Moon is needed if humanity is to have a fighting chance of surviving the ravages of climate change. The stakes are high, as, without sustainable growth, "billions of people will be condemned to poverty and much of civilization will collapse".
This is the stark warning from the biggest single report to look at the future of the planet - obtained by The Independent on Sunday ahead of its official publication next month. Backed by a diverse range of leading organizations such as UNESCO, the World Bank, the US army and the Rockefeller Foundation, the 2009 State of the Future report runs to 6,700 pages and draws on contributions from 2,700 experts around the globe. Its findings are described by Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the UN, as providing "invaluable insights into the future for the United Nations, its member states, and civil society".
The impact of the global recession is a key theme, with researchers warning that global clean energy, food availability, poverty and the growth of democracy around the world are at "risk of getting worse due to the recession". The report adds: "Too many greedy and deceitful decisions led to a world recession and demonstrated the international interdependence of economics and ethics."
Although the future has been looking better for most of the world over the past 20 years, the global recession has lowered the State of the Future Index for the next 10 years. Half the world could face violence and unrest due to severe unemployment combined with scarce water, food and energy supplies and the cumulative effects of climate change.
And the authors of the report, produced by the Millennium Project - a think-tank formerly part of the World Federation of the United Nations Associations - set out a number of emerging environmental security issues. "The scope and scale of the future effects of climate change - ranging from changes in weather patterns to loss of livelihoods and disappearing states - has unprecedented implications for political and social stability."
But the authors suggest the threats could also provide the potential for a positive future for all. "The good news is that the global financial crisis and climate change planning may be helping humanity to move from its often selfish, self-centered adolescence to a more globally responsible adulthood... Many perceive the current economic disaster as an opportunity to invest in the next generation of greener technologies, to rethink economic and development assumptions, and to put the world on course for a better future."
Scientific and technological progress continues to accelerate. IBM promises a computer at 20,000 trillion calculations per second by 2011, which is estimated to be the speed of the human brain. And nanomedicine may one day rebuild damaged cells atom by atom, using nanobots the size of blood cells. But technological progress carries its own risks. "Globalization and advanced technology allow fewer people to do more damage and in less time, so that possibly one day a single individual may be able to make and deploy a weapon of mass destruction."
The report also praises the web, which it singles out as "the most powerful force for globalization, democratization, economic growth, and education in history". Technological advances are cited as "giving birth to an interdependent humanity that can create and implement global strategies to improve the prospects for humanity".
The immediate problems are rising food and energy prices, shortages of water and increasing migrations "due to political, environmental and economic conditions", which could plunge half the world into social instability and violence. And organized crime is flourishing, with a global income estimated at $3 trillion - twice the military budgets of all countries in the world combined.
The effects of climate change are worsening - by 2025 there could be three billion people without adequate water as the population rises still further. And massive urbanization, increased encroachment on animal territory, and concentrated livestock production could trigger new pandemics.
Although government and business leaders are responding more seriously to the global environmental situation, it continues to get worse, according to the report. It calls on governments to work to 10-year plans to tackle growing threats to human survival, targeting particularly the US and China, which need to apply the sort of effort and resources that put men on the Moon.
"This is not only important for the environment; it is also a strategy to increase the likelihood of international peace. Without some agreement, it will be difficult to get the kind of global coherence needed to address climate change seriously."
While the world has the resources to address its challenges, coherence and direction have been lacking. Recent meetings of the US and China, as well as of Nato and Russia, and the birth of the G20 plus the continued work of the G8 promise to improve global strategic collaboration, but "it remains to be seen if this spirit of co-operation can continue and if decisions will be made on the scale necessary to really address the global challenges discussed in this report".
Although the scale of the effects of climate change are unprecedented, the causes are generally known, and the consequences can largely be forecast. The report says, "coordination for effective and adequate action is yet incipient, and environmental problems worsen faster than response or preventive policies are being adopted".
Jerome Glenn, director of the Millennium Project and one of the report's authors, said: "There are answers to our global challenges, but decisions are still not being made on the scale necessary to address them. Three great transitions would help both the world economy and its natural environment - to shift as much as possible from freshwater agriculture to saltwater agriculture; produce healthier meat without the need to grow animals; and replace gasoline cars with electric cars." |
| |
|
|
 
|
|
 Goto page Previous
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30,
31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60,
61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77 Next
All times are GMT. The time now is Fri Feb 10, 2012 4:53 am
|
|
|
|
|
Login
