Posted: Wed Oct 04, 2006 10:57 am Post subject: Re: Global warming will threaten millions say climate scient
rockdoc123 wrote:
Quote from the Guardian article:
Quote:
Using a climate model, they showed that in the last decade of the 20th century droughts were nearly 25% more widespread than in the previous 40 years.
When the scientists altered the model to remove the warming effect of greenhouse gas emissions from human activity, they found that droughts barely changed. "It's clear the increase in drought we've seen in the past decade or so has in part been down to human activity," said Dr Pope. The scientists next used the model to predict how droughts were likely to change in the coming century, assuming greenhouse gas emissions continue on an upward trend. "It amounts to a doubling of droughts," said Dr Pope.
Uncertainties in the model mean the prediction may overstate the threat of droughts, but until further studies are done it will be impossible to know by how much, she added.
First of all this is all modeled and requires positive feedbacks in CO2 to occur which noone is certain will happen. If on the other hand we see water vapor increasing as a negative feedback it is entirely possible that you could see more rain and less droughts. The one really compelling statement is that "the prediction may overstate the threat of droughts".....precisely but it didn't stop them from doing just that...overstating the threat. This sort of fear mongering is doing no one any favors, especially the scientists who are diligently working away in the background. All it takes is a few overblown predictions to fail and they lose all of their credibility. I think we are currently seeing that happen with the "windbags" (pun intented here) who predicted global warming was the cause of increasing frequency and strength of hurricanes and that this year would be worse than the last. I've come across a number of statements in the press ridiculing these predicitions and as a consequence the scientists doing the actual research. This sort of thing is not conducive to getting to the answers to my mind.
Sorta like jumpin into the water without knowing what's down there...
Sometimes you just get wet... & other times you get critical brain trauma.
These studies are like a clear pool of water with stuff you can see on the bottom. You know it's there, but can't really tell how deep it is.
Until it's too late. _________________ "When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours." - Stephen F Roberts.
Joined: Oct 23, 2004 Posts: 5504 Location: New Jersey
Posted: Wed Oct 04, 2006 11:07 am Post subject: Re: Global warming will threaten millions say climate scient
rockdoc123 wrote:
I think we are currently seeing that happen with the "windbags" (pun intented here) who predicted global warming was the cause of increasing frequency and strength of hurricanes and that this year would be worse than the last. I've come across a number of statements in the press ridiculing these predicitions and as a consequence the scientists doing the actual research. This sort of thing is not conducive to getting to the answers to my mind.
We already debated the issue elsewhere here of how many actually predicted more hurricanes this year than last. First of all, I am not sure we are having less hurricanes/typhoons this year than last when considering the whole world. And those hurricanes/typhoons have been very powerful.
And who says the first and worst effect of GW is just weather? What if GW spawns the spread of disease, human or plant, which devastates the health of billions?
Posted: Wed Oct 04, 2006 1:09 pm Post subject: Re: Global warming will threaten millions say climate scient
Quote:
These studies are like a clear pool of water with stuff you can see on the bottom. You know it's there, but can't really tell how deep it is.
Actually I would change that to read "slightly murky pool of water with unidentifiable stuff you can see on the bottom....."
The problem is that without knowing what is down there jumping in is not always the best idea....it could be a pot of gold or a passle of crocodiles, or you might get swept away by the undertow before you can reach the objects to find out.
My view is the same as Roger Pielke's ....CO2 may be contributing or it may not, bottom line is that cutting emissions significantly is likely going to have very little effect (and maybe not the effect you want) and is going to cost trillions of dollars according to the estimates. Pielke's view is that this money is better spent in teaching and assisting folks in adapting to climate change, much of which may be naturally driven.
The Climate Science Weblog has clearly documented the following conclusions since July 2005:
The needed focus for the study of climate change and variability is on the regional and local scales. Global and zonally-averaged climate metrics would only be important to the extent that they provide useful information on these space scales.
Global and zonally-averaged surface temperature trend assessments, besides having major difficulties in terms of how this metric is diagnosed and analyzed, do not provide significant information on climate change and variability on the regional and local scales.
Global warming is not equivalent to climate change. Significant, societally important climate change, due to both natural- and human- climate forcings, can occur without any global warming or cooling.
The spatial pattern of ocean heat content change is the appropriate metric to assess climate system heat changes including global warming.
In terms of climate change and variability on the regional and local scale, the IPCC Reports, the CCSP Report on surface and tropospheric temperature trends, and the U.S. National
Assessment have overstated the role of the radiative effect of the anthropogenic increase of CO2 relative to the role of the diversity of other human climate climate forcing on global warming, and more generally, on climate variability and change.
Global and regional climate models have not demonstrated skill at predicting climate change and variability on multi-decadal time scales.
Attempts to significantly influence regional and local-scale climate based on controlling CO2 emissions alone is an inadequate policy for this purpose.
A vulnerability paradigm, focused on regional and local societal and environmental resources of importance, is a more inclusive, useful, and scientifically robust framework to interact with policymakers, than is the focus on global multi-decadal climate predictions which are downscaled to the regional and local scales. The vulnerability paradigm permits the evaluation of the entire spectrum of risks associated with different social and environmental threats, including climate variability and change.
Humans are significantly altering the global climate, but in a variety of diverse ways beyond the radiative effect of carbon dioxide. The IPCC assessments have been too conservative in recognizing the importance of these human climate forcings as they alter regional and global climate. These assessments have also not communicated the inability of the models to accurately forecast the spread of possibilities of future climate. The forecasts, therefore, do not provide any skill in quantifying the impact of different mitigation strategies on the actual climate response
that would occur.
His main concern seems to be too much focus on CO2 to the exlcusion of the effects of other human impacts on climate.
More effort needed to understand regional impacts so as to design better mitigation and adaption strategies.
Joined: Mar 04, 2005 Posts: 2576 Location: New Zealand
Posted: Wed Oct 04, 2006 10:33 pm Post subject: Arctic Sea Ice Shrinks As Temperatures Rise
Arctic Sea Ice Shrinks As Temperatures Rise
Quote:
The latest measurements indicate the Arctic sea ice minimum reached on Sept. 14 was the fourth lowest on record in 29 years of satellite record-keeping, said CU-Boulder Research Professor Mark Serreze of the CU-Boulder's National Snow and Ice Data Center. The ice has been declining at about 8.6 percent per decade, or at about 23 million square miles per year -- an area more than half the size of Ohio, he said.
"At this rate, the Arctic Ocean will have no ice in September by the year 2060," said CU-Boulder researcher Julienne Stroeve of NSIDC, which is part of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, a joint institute of CU-Boulder and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "The loss of summer sea ice does not bode well for species like the polar bear, which depend on the ice for their livelihood."
sciencedaily _________________ Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe. H. G. Wells.
Fatih Birol's motto: leave oil before it leaves us.
Joined: Sep 14, 2004 Posts: 6160 Location: Rural Virginia
Posted: Thu Oct 05, 2006 7:08 am Post subject: Re: Arctic Sea Ice Shrinks As Temperatures Rise
And still we do nothing.
Other than add more greenhouse emissions to the atmosphere each year than the year before. _________________ "Actually, humans died out long ago."
---Abused, abandoned hunting dog
"Things have entered a stage where the only change that is possible is for things to get worse."
---Me and my brother
Posted: Thu Oct 05, 2006 1:59 pm Post subject: Re: Arctic Sea Ice Shrinks As Temperatures Rise
It does not help that we have a mild hurricane season this year.
Also, important to note that there are places where ice are forming and ice mass are getting bigger and bigger. So it is not so simple that Antarctica and Arctic ice masses are melting. Another key point is the extrapolation that if this rate held steady we will have significant issues is a bad assumption or warning. These numbers may fluctuate and are not linear.
I think it is important to shape public opinion, so that they don't think global warming is not happening simply because we have one good year or two. This should be expected.
Posted: Fri Oct 06, 2006 3:57 am Post subject: Re: Canadians expect failure on climate change
Almost 71 per cent of Canadians believe major companies with huge profits should be forced to pay more to clean up the environment, even if it means driving them out of business.
Thats' what should happen, but the free market, and high energy use is whats' given us our quality of life.
The old equal and opposite reaction, its' a doozy. _________________ "One minute I held the key, next the walls were closed on me, and I discovered that my castle stands upon pillars of salt and pillars of sand."
Joined: Dec 04, 2004 Posts: 2337 Location: perpetual state of exhaustion
Posted: Fri Oct 06, 2006 1:40 pm Post subject: Re: Canadians expect failure on climate change
Like we didn't know this was going to happen. Especially when the past Prime Minister didn't even register his shipping fleet in his own home country to avoid taxes and bothersome inspections.
and this prime minister who is Bush's "mini-me". Soooo bloody suprised. NOT!
Joined: Nov 08, 2005 Posts: 258 Location: The Maple State
Posted: Fri Oct 06, 2006 6:21 pm Post subject: Re: Canadians expect failure on climate change
Quote:
and this prime minister who is Bush's "mini-me".
I hope those are not 'the good old days of 2006'
Quote:
There is no question that we must make stopping a Stephen Harper majority a priority in the next few months. But we should not make the same mistake as we did in the 80s and 90s and assume that getting rid of him will solve our problems.
If we get Michael Ignatieff as prime minister it could be just as bad. He is as arrogant as Harper, supports the Bush on Iraq and on “pre-emptive war”, is a patrician member of the super-elite with contempt for democracy and would almost certainly support deep integration - indeed having spent 30 years outside of Canada and much of it at Harvard (the training ground of the US elite, including Gg W. Bush) he is primed to accelerate the process of annexation.
http://www.vivelecanada.ca/article.php/20061003085433355
We may have solid Plutacracy on both sides of the 49th soon.
You cannot post new topics in this forum You cannot reply to topics in this forum You cannot edit your posts in this forum You cannot delete your posts in this forum You cannot vote in polls in this forum
News
Discussions
Resources
Members
Forum FAQ
Search
Usergroups
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
