Global Warming - running out of time to prevent ECONOMIC disaster

[Conradl]

Wow, you actually got them .. shocked .. but then again, in these Google times, its easy to pretend to know something eh?



Then again, with statements like this, yeah .. you go girl.

Let us see .. AGW stands for what now .. hmm .. oh yeah .. Anthropogenic Global Warming.

You see .. even if Global Warming could be proved (and it hasn't by a longshot), what about the "A" part?

You only have belief in the Hansen, the Schmidt and others like them.

The world temperatures remain in the band as they have for centuries and this "short-term-variability" will continue for a long while.

PS, I expect a little warmening over time -- we are coming out of an ice-age, that is what happens, until, we start going back into an ice-age .. then be afraid, be very afraid.

Until world weather shows dramatic warming .. out of band warming, you don't have jack!

Hey BWA, was wondering if you had a chance to look at the paper I referenced above? I would encourage you to look it over, I am keen to see what you think?

 

[BCO]

Hey BWA, was wondering if you had a chance to look at the paper I referenced above? I would encourage you to look it over, I am keen to see what you think?

I was only able to access the abstract here:

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v453/n7193/full/nature06937.html

Looks very interesting, any ideas where the full text can be found? PS Conrad, don't expect any actual answers from BWA all he does is spew forth the same rehashed arguments ad nauseum. I'm not sure he's taken the time to do anything more than skim over any of the articles I've posted in this thread.

@ BWA - funny despite your continued rantings, you failed to answer a single question I asked you yesterday.

 

[BandwidthAddict]

First of all, this is not a debate, your opinion does not matter to me.

I have already made up my mind and until absolute, unquestionable evidence of actual negative weather effects due to "global warming" can be shown, I don't care bubkis for theoretical or extrapolatory research. The Earth biosphere weather and climate mechanism is not fully known or understood so computer models just extrapolate the unknown, IE, they are worthless.

World-wide weather has been in-band up till now, so whatever GW is, it is not important to me.

Also, Hansen, Mann et al have been shown to be less than honest people and scientists that are not rigorously honest, are worthless. Gore is a politician so we expect him to lie.

I am only keeping this thread alive so when AGW is disproven, I will have my "I told you so" moment. Childish, yes, but then again, that's me

BTW, anybody that tells me that climate is some special mystical thing that is more important than weather, or has more impact on us than weather, is a religious nutjob .. that mean you BC.

 

[BCO]

First of all, this is not a debate, your opinion does not matter to me.

1) I never offered an opinion. We've been talking about the best scientific knowledge available to us at this time, NOT my opinion.

2) Still, thanks for making explicit what's been clear since the beginning - you're not interested at all in anything besides what you've already decided to be the "truth".

I have already made up my mind and until absolute, unquestionable evidence of actual negative weather effects due to "global warming" can be shown, I don't care bubkis for theoretical or extrapolatory research. The Earth biosphere weather and climate mechanism is not fully known or understood so computer models just extrapolate the unknown, IE, they are worthless.

See (2) above.

Also, Hansen, Mann et al have been shown to be less than honest people and scientists that are not rigorously honest, are worthless. Gore is a politician so we expect him to lie.

My irony meter is honestly going off the charts. You have the nerve to talk about honesty and then go and quote "scientific studies" by organisations like The Heartland Institute and OISM? WTF?

I am only keeping this thread alive so when AGW is disproven, I will have my "I told you so" moment. Childish, yes, but then again, that's me

Good luck with that.

BTW, anybody that tells me that climate is some special mystical thing that is more important than weather, or has more impact on us than weather, is a religious nutjob .. that mean you BC.

Whatever dude. This thread has clearly demonstrated to any rational person who cares to read it that you're the nutjob here. This is illustrated quite nicely in some of the comments directed at you.

http://mybroadband.co.za/vb/showpost.php?p=1874176&postcount=11

http://mybroadband.co.za/vb/showpost.php?p=1884878&postcount=25

and my personal favourite:

http://mybroadband.co.za/vb/showpost.php?p=1895562&postcount=31


I'm installing Greasemonkey now. So have a nice life and fsck you very much, ****ing troll.

 

[BattleMoose]

This thread, really is something, bizarre.

First point, BWA, your rhetoric, how you choose to express yourself and your position, isn't doing you any favours. If your intent is to actually try to convince people, than my advice to you is to calm down your rhetoric and get straight to the point of your argument.

I haven't read the whole thread, it was getting painful, very painful.

The orskes report has already been cited, which if you read it, you would know that there is no peer reviewed literature that opposes the view that AGW is occuring.

Then there are the statements released by the AAAS and NAS and just about every single credible scientific organisation on the planet.

The scientific evidence is clear: global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now, and it is a growing threat to society. Accumulating data from across the globe reveal a wide array of effects: rapidly melting glaciers, destabilization of major ice sheets, increases in extreme weather, rising sea level, shifts in species ranges, and more. The pace of change and the evidence of harm have increased markedly over the last five years. The time to control greenhouse gas emissions is now.

http://www.aaas.org/news/releases/2007/0218am_statement.shtml

The AAAS is responsbile for publishing Science, journal, which is one of the most credible scientific journals on the planet and contains some of the best science that our species has been able to produce.

That alone should be enough to convince the average lay person that AGW is a serious issue.

And then there is the horde of observable changes that our climate is experiencing. You seem to have an issue with temperature graphs, and instead of trying to convince that they are reliable, its easier to go with evidence that is nigh impossible to refute.

Observable sea level rise.

Observable artic ice depletion. (Yes I know the artic ice cap made gains in 2008, but don't get distracted by that, the downward trend continues)

Its hard to know exactly where your position is, there are so many to take and you seem to take all of them. I'll list them and maybe you can help me out.

1. Climate Change isn't happening

2. Climate Change is happening, but its not anthropogenic

3. All peer reviewed science (on climate change) cannot be trusted because the authors are getting alot of money to perpetuate the notion. (I find this one particulliarly peculiar, all the scientists I know don't make alot of money, aren't wealthy individuals, because of the work they do, scientists don't do science to get rich. Incidentally these are highly intelligent individuals who could make alot of money in the private sector, if thats what they wanted)

I am interested in your response, although I am almost certain nothing can convince you.

 

[BCO]

Hehe, nice post to make after a 2 year break from MyBB

 

[Conradl]

First of all, this is not a debate, your opinion does not matter to me.

I have already made up my mind and until absolute, unquestionable evidence of actual negative weather effects due to "global warming" can be shown, I don't care bubkis for theoretical or extrapolatory research. The Earth biosphere weather and climate mechanism is not fully known or understood so computer models just extrapolate the unknown, IE, they are worthless.

World-wide weather has been in-band up till now, so whatever GW is, it is not important to me.

Also, Hansen, Mann et al have been shown to be less than honest people and scientists that are not rigorously honest, are worthless. Gore is a politician so we expect him to lie.

I am only keeping this thread alive so when AGW is disproven, I will have my "I told you so" moment. Childish, yes, but then again, that's me

BTW, anybody that tells me that climate is some special mystical thing that is more important than weather, or has more impact on us than weather, is a religious nutjob .. that mean you BC.

Did you actually read the research I have referenced? Just to make it clear, I don't mean to waste your time; the paper I referenced is a significant finding. It is based on 29 000 data sets and measures, amongst others, the observable, not modeled, impacts of AGW. It also gives explanations for why certain areas are getting colder.

While I don't think its correct to quote certain parts of the paper (it should be viewed in its complete form), this is from the conclusion:

Out of the 29,500 data series documented in ,80 studies included in the
database, effects documented in only 3 studies (9 data series in 4
cells) were likely to have been caused by a driving force other than
climate change (for example, habitat destruction, pollution or fishery
by-catch disposal). Removing these data series from the statistical
analyses does not change the results significantly.
Land-use change can affect physical and biological systems
indirectly through its effects on climate. Yet, for recent climate trends
on a global scale, the effect of land-use change is small
31
. In addition,
because these effects may result in warming in some regions and
cooling in others (for example, agricultural expansion tends to warm
the Amazon and cool themid-latitudes)
33,34
, they are very unlikely to
explain the coherent responses that have been found across the
diverse range of systems and across the continental and global scales
considered (Supplementary Table 2). Cooling in temperate regions
occurs because the clearing of forests for agriculture may increase
albedo during periods of snow cover, although recent afforestation
may be dampening this effect.

 

[BattleMoose]

Well, I was hoping to get a response, but I guess not. :/

 

[Phronesis]

1. Climate Change isn't happening

2. Climate Change is happening, but its not anthropogenic

3. All peer reviewed science (on climate change) cannot be trusted because the authors are getting alot of money to perpetuate the notion. (I find this one particulliarly peculiar, all the scientists I know don't make alot of money, aren't wealthy individuals, because of the work they do, scientists don't do science to get rich. Incidentally these are highly intelligent individuals who could make alot of money in the private sector, if thats what they wanted)

I'll pick number 2 (with a little change). Climate change is happening and it has been happening for... well millions and millions of years. Whether our activities are contributing to climate and the magnitude our activities affect this pattern remains to be proven. It was about global warming, not climate change. Climate change can mean just about anything. Is it getting hotter, is it getting colder, is it getting windier, is it getting drier? "Climate change" pundits will take just about any of the above flavours of climate change and say "look, bah! Climate change!"

Yes, CO2 does contribute to the greenhouse effect, but does the greenhouse effect contribute to cooling? And it is worth mentioning there are other more potent greenhouse gases.

How massive is CO2 contribution to climate change?
This paper states:

The resultant equilibrium climate sensitivity, 0.30 ± 0.14 K/(W m-2), corresponds to an equilibrium temperature increase for doubled CO2 of 1.1 ± 0.5 K.

Only 1.1 degree (max 1.6, min 0.6) increase if CO2 doubles. What is the estimated doubling time?
A New Look at Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide

Carbon dioxide is increasing in the atmosphere and is of considerable concern in global climate change because of its greenhouse gas warming potential. The rate of increase has accelerated since measurements began at Mauna Loa Observatory in 1958 where carbon dioxide increased from less than 1 part per million per year (ppm/yr) prior to 1970 to more than 2 ppm/yr in recent years (Keeling et al., 1995). This accelerating growth rate, which the London Guardian (2007) headlined a “Surge in carbon levels raises fear of runaway warming”, suggested that the terrestrial biosphere and oceans ability to take up carbon dioxide may be lessening as predicted from models and data (Fung et al., 2005; Le Quéré et al., 2007). Here we show that the anthropogenic component (atmospheric value reduced by the pre-industrial value of 280 ppm) of atmospheric carbon dioxide has been increasing exponentially with a doubling time of about 35 years since the beginning of the industrial revolution (~1800). Even during the 1970's, when fossil fuel emissions dropped sharply in response to the “oil crisis” of 1973, the anthropogenic atmospheric carbon dioxide level continued increasing exponentially at Mauna Loa Observatory. Since the growth rate (time derivative) of an exponential has the same characteristic lifetime as the function itself, the carbon dioxide growth rate is also doubling at the same rate. This explains the observation that the linear growth rate of carbon dioxide has more than doubled in the past 40 years. The accelerating linear growth rate is simply the outcome of exponential growth in carbon dioxide with a nearly constant doubling time of about 35 years (about 2 %/yr) and appears to have tracked human population since the pre-industrial era.

35 years doubling time resulting in an increase of 1.1 degrees.

Luckily one of the "oceanic pumps" surprisingly switched on again.
Surprising Return of North Atlantic Circulation Pump

(Media-Newswire.com) - One of the “pumps” contributing to the ocean’s global circulation suddenly switched on again last winter for the first time this decade, scientists reported Tuesday ( Dec. 23 ) in Nature Geoscience. The finding surprised scientists, who had been wondering if global warming was inhibiting the pump—which, in turn, would cause other far-reaching climate changes.

The “pump” in question is the sinking of cold, dense water in the North Atlantic Ocean in the winter. It drives water down into the lower limb of what is often described as the Great Ocean Conveyor. To replace that down-flowing water, warm surface waters from the tropics are pulled northward along the Conveyor’s upper limb.

The phenomenon helps draw down the man-made buildup of carbon dioxide from air to surface waters and eventually into the depths, where the greenhouse gas can be stored for centuries and offset global warming. It also transports warm tropical waters northward, where the ocean transfers heat to the air and keeps winter climate in the North Atlantic region much warmer than it would be otherwise.

So, a 35 year doubling (which is a massive amount of CO2) with a 1.1 degrees increase and now one of the "pumps" restarted to help remove atmospheric CO2.

Is AGW massive? Or has it become "any old change in climate" is massive?

Besides, a little extra CO2 is actually good for food production.
High CO2 boosts plant respiration, potentially affecting climate and crops

As to sea level rise. Hasn't it been rising for the past 10 000 years, and how do those rates compare to the present rate?
Ice caps melting at a rapid pace? How good has the recent recovery been?
And how well does sunspot activity relate to climate change?

 

[Arthur]

Der Spiegel, the major German newsweekly, has uncovered a real problem for the Church of Global Warming:

Wind Turbines in Europe Do Nothing for Emissions-Reduction Goals

By Anselm Waldermann

10 February 2009

Despite Europe's boom in solar and wind energy, CO2 emissions haven't been reduced by even a single gram. Now, even the Green Party is taking a new look at the issue -- as shown in e-mails obtained by SPIEGEL ONLINE.

Germany's renewable energy companies are a tremendous success story. Roughly 15 percent of the country's electricity comes from solar, wind or biomass facilities, almost 250,000 jobs have been created and the net worth of the business is €35 billion per year.

But there's a catch: The climate hasn't in fact profited from these developments. As astonishing as it may sound, the new wind turbines and solar cells haven't prohibited the emission of even a single gram of CO2.

Even more surprising, the European Union's own climate change policies, touted as the most progressive in the world, are to blame. The EU-wide emissions trading system determines the total amount of CO2 that can be emitted by power companies and industries. And this amount doesn't change -- no matter how many wind turbines are erected.

... more

 

[BCO]

Der Spiegel, the major German newsweekly, has uncovered a real problem for the Church of Global Warming:

The article describes a problem with Germany's energy policy, not the technology itself. Not sure exactly how this poses any problem at all to the "Church of Global Warming", whatever that is.

 

[BattleMoose]

@Phronesis

Interesting viewpoint you have, your drawing conclusions on the data that you have, and based on the data that you have (or rather presented here) they seem like perfectly reasonable conclusions. Let me present you with new data or rather more/different data and hopefully your conclusions will change.

Climate has always been changing:

This is true, and the causes of it aren't exactly mysterious, there are good theories of why and what causes these fluctuations. Such as, but certainly not limited to, milankovitch cycles. These effects work on very long timescales and are most certainly not due any time soon.

And if you want to know just how rapidly our climate can, and indeed has changed in the past, I also direct you to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dansgaard-Oeschger_event , which has been a natural ocurring phenomenon, with temperature increases of 8K over 40 years. Yes, this is a natural occuring phenemenon, and has a cyclic nature to it, and we arent anywhere near due to one either. Also on a side, not all that much is known of these events either.

The point I am trying to make here is this, is yes, I agree with you, our climate is always constantly changing, and can be very volatile at times too, poking it with a stick is a really bad idea.

Also, the rate of CO2 emissions that we are currently experiencing is completely unprecendented within the historic record, nothing like this has ever occured naturally before, ever.

Global Warming Versus Climate Change

You will find in the scientific literature its usually referred to as Climate Change with some authors even preferring the term Climate Destabilisation. Global Warming is a misnomer and even misleading, average global temperatures are going to increase, with local temperatures depending where you are, staying relatively the same (Antarctica), decreasing (UK and Europe) or experiencing very rapid temperature increases (Arctic).

But the issue is not that a warmer planet is bad or even dangerous (Depends if you want to count hurricanes), the danger comes from shifting rainfall patterns (mostly) and how that effects rivers/lakes/dams, water security and food crops. The threat for human suffering comes from water shortages, famine and consequently epidemics and migrations of vast numbers of people escaping such threats. They might not even notice its warmer. The climate is incredibly sensitive to even small temperature changes.

For projections of temperature increase I direct you to, http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/Global_Warming_Predictions.png

Which, if you look at them carefully, you can see that from 2000, there will only be a 1K increase over a period of 30-40 years. Ofcourse it really does matter from when you start your comparison, I also direct you to http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn14527. Viewing at the graph from about 1940, we have already experienced a temperature increase of roughly 0.6K.

I realise these numbers don't seem scary at all, but we really are talking about average increases of 0.6K and expected increases of 1K within 30 or so years. You should also reaslise that an average temperature increase of 2K is considered to severe/catastrophic.

I direct you to http://www.csis.org/component/option,com_csis_pubs/task,view/id,4154/type,1/ "The Age of Consequences" , its a very lengthy document and perhaps you would be best to first look at the scenarios that it is first considering. There is the Expected Scenario, of 1.3K temp increase over 30 years, Severe Scenario, 2.3K over 30 years and the Catastrophic Scenario 5.6K temp increase over the next 100 years. For all practicalities, the Expected Scenario is completely unavoidable at this point. And before anyone else says it, I will, its very easy to dismiss this document as doom saying, fear mongering, because it is scary. And its scary because the future is scary. We should be scared.

As to your link on the North Atlantic Circulation Pump, I was completely unaware it had shut down and severly doubt the intergrity of the reporting thereof. I am sorry but the media has an absolutely appalling record of reporting accuratly on anything regarding climate change.

But on this note, the oceans are asorbing alot of CO2, while this is probably a good thing, its not without its consequences. I direct you to the Monaco Declaration, you can google it and download it in pdf form, a short extract.

As this CO2 dissolves in seawater, it forms
carbonic acid, increasing ocean acidity. Since industrialization
began in the 18th century, surface-ocean acidity has increased
by 30%. This ongoing ocean acidification is decreasing the
ability of many marine organisms to build their shells and
skeletal structure. Increasing acidity and related changes in
seawater chemistry also affect reproduction, behaviour, and
general physiological functions of some marine organisms,
such as oysters, sea urchins, and squid.

Plants.

Again, higher CO2 concentrations do have a benefical effect on plants. It also needs to be noted that the effect of CO2 concentrations on plant growth is relatively minor when compared to the effect of higher temperatures and rainfall. Also, the kind of plants that are growing in some areas is changing because of higher CO2 concentrations, in some areas, shrubs are being replaced by more woody plants, as the woody plants benefit more from higher CO2 concentration and are able to dominate.

Some areas will become more fertile, think cold northern latitudes, while other areas will have changing temperature and changing rainfall patterns. Its impossible to describe all of this in text. There will be much greater food insecurity as areas that we are dependant on for food, fail or produce lower yields. I have a paper at work, referencing the Chinese governments estimates on how it expects Chinas food crops to reduce.

Ice Caps

While very warm temperatures were also seen in the Arctic in the 1930s, the loss of Arctic sea ice observed in the past 20 years has no precedent in the historical record. For example, the fabled Northwest Passage opened in 2007, an event that has not occurred since at least 1497, and probably for a much longer span of time. Between 1979 (the year satellite imagery of the North Pole first became available) and 2006, Arctic sea ice extent shrunk by about 10% in winter (4% per decade) and 20% in summer (8% per decade). The loss of sea ice, when plotted on a graph (Figure 3), roughly followed a straight line over time. There were a few noisy ups and downs, reflecting colder and warmer years. A trend that approximately follows a straight line is called a "linear" trend. A continued linear summertime 8% per decade loss of sea ice would leave the summertime Arctic Ocean ice-free by 2100. The ocean would still partially freeze in winter, with about 50% of the ocean covered with ice.

http://www.wunderground.com/climate/SeaIce.asp?MR=1

There is a fairly linear trend line in the reduction of Artic Sea Ice, the Summer Ice of 2008 follows this trend in reduction. The summer of 2007 was way below this trend, and let me know if you figure out how or why, because it surprised everyone, completely unexpected. The summer ice of 2008, was larger than that of 2007, but the steady reduction of arctic sea ice continues, and shows no signs of slowing up.

ftp://sidads.colorado.edu//DATASETS/NOAA/G02135/Aug/N_08_plot.png

That link is just for one month, go to, http://nsidc.org/cgi-bin/bist/bist....r0=2009&mo1=09&year1=2009&.cgifields=no_panel and you can have acess to all the data that exists on sea ice extent since recording began.

As to sea level rise. Hasn't it been rising for the past 10 000 years, and how do those rates compare to the present rate?

I am not sure how that makes sense, if sea level has been rising for 10 000 years, shouldnt the sea level be much higher? But rhetoric aside, I dont really know what the sea level has been doing going back further than 1880. Never come up before and I never thought of asking. But for recent sea level rise, http://s238.photobucket.com/albums/ff250/BattleM00se/?action=view&current=Recent_Sea_Level_Rise.png.

Wow, and as always this ends up being more of an essay than a post, I hope you find it informative.

 

[BattleMoose]

Der Spiegel, the major German newsweekly, has uncovered a real problem for the Church of Global Warming:

This is the biggest load of absolute nonsense I have heard in a long time. Not sure what this forums rules are on swearing, but this is ****ing bull****! Its just plainly untrue.

Germany has been doing just about the most out of any country in the world regarding energy efficiencies and rewnewable energies. This is evident from the fact that her CO2 emissions today are lower than that of 1990, incredibly marginally lower, but lower and thats with a growing economy and growing population and increasing energy use. As far as I am aware, no other country can make such a boast. (The report is at my work and I will reference it if asked, its 21:00 and I am at home, of course)

The energy that is produced by solar and wind in germany is energy that isnt being produced by coal and that means less co2 emissions as a result. The article really failed at demonstrating an ability to think.

Honestly, I don't agree with how Germany is going about reducing CO2 emissions, I think there are better ways of doing it, (I prefer the French approach) but it is certainly working at reducing CO2 emissions, that much is completely undeniable.

EDIT: Ah, there is a swearing filter.

 

[Phronesis]

@Phronesis

Interesting viewpoint you have, your drawing conclusions on the data that you have, and based on the data that you have (or rather presented here) they seem like perfectly reasonable conclusions. Let me present you with new data or rather more/different data and hopefully your conclusions will change.

Climate has always been changing:

This is true, and the causes of it aren't exactly mysterious, there are good theories of why and what causes these fluctuations. Such as, but certainly not limited to, milankovitch cycles. These effects work on very long timescales and are most certainly not due any time soon.

And if you want to know just how rapidly our climate can, and indeed has changed in the past, I also direct you to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dansgaard-Oeschger_event , which has been a natural ocurring phenomenon, with temperature increases of 8K over 40 years. Yes, this is a natural occuring phenemenon, and has a cyclic nature to it, and we arent anywhere near due to one either. Also on a side, not all that much is known of these events either.

The point I am trying to make here is this, is yes, I agree with you, our climate is always constantly changing, and can be very volatile at times too, poking it with a stick is a really bad idea.

Also, the rate of CO2 emissions that we are currently experiencing is completely unprecendented within the historic record, nothing like this has ever occured naturally before, ever.

Global Warming Versus Climate Change

You will find in the scientific literature its usually referred to as Climate Change with some authors even preferring the term Climate Destabilisation. Global Warming is a misnomer and even misleading, average global temperatures are going to increase, with local temperatures depending where you are, staying relatively the same (Antarctica), decreasing (UK and Europe) or experiencing very rapid temperature increases (Arctic).

But the issue is not that a warmer planet is bad or even dangerous (Depends if you want to count hurricanes), the danger comes from shifting rainfall patterns (mostly) and how that effects rivers/lakes/dams, water security and food crops. The threat for human suffering comes from water shortages, famine and consequently epidemics and migrations of vast numbers of people escaping such threats. They might not even notice its warmer. The climate is incredibly sensitive to even small temperature changes.

For projections of temperature increase I direct you to, http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/Global_Warming_Predictions.png

Which, if you look at them carefully, you can see that from 2000, there will only be a 1K increase over a period of 30-40 years. Ofcourse it really does matter from when you start your comparison, I also direct you to http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn14527. Viewing at the graph from about 1940, we have already experienced a temperature increase of roughly 0.6K.

I realise these numbers don't seem scary at all, but we really are talking about average increases of 0.6K and expected increases of 1K within 30 or so years. You should also reaslise that an average temperature increase of 2K is considered to severe/catastrophic.

I direct you to http://www.csis.org/component/option,com_csis_pubs/task,view/id,4154/type,1/ "The Age of Consequences" , its a very lengthy document and perhaps you would be best to first look at the scenarios that it is first considering. There is the Expected Scenario, of 1.3K temp increase over 30 years, Severe Scenario, 2.3K over 30 years and the Catastrophic Scenario 5.6K temp increase over the next 100 years. For all practicalities, the Expected Scenario is completely unavoidable at this point. And before anyone else says it, I will, its very easy to dismiss this document as doom saying, fear mongering, because it is scary. And its scary because the future is scary. We should be scared.

As to your link on the North Atlantic Circulation Pump, I was completely unaware it had shut down and severly doubt the intergrity of the reporting thereof. I am sorry but the media has an absolutely appalling record of reporting accuratly on anything regarding climate change.

But on this note, the oceans are asorbing alot of CO2, while this is probably a good thing, its not without its consequences. I direct you to the Monaco Declaration, you can google it and download it in pdf form, a short extract.



Plants.

Again, higher CO2 concentrations do have a benefical effect on plants. It also needs to be noted that the effect of CO2 concentrations on plant growth is relatively minor when compared to the effect of higher temperatures and rainfall. Also, the kind of plants that are growing in some areas is changing because of higher CO2 concentrations, in some areas, shrubs are being replaced by more woody plants, as the woody plants benefit more from higher CO2 concentration and are able to dominate.

Some areas will become more fertile, think cold northern latitudes, while other areas will have changing temperature and changing rainfall patterns. Its impossible to describe all of this in text. There will be much greater food insecurity as areas that we are dependant on for food, fail or produce lower yields. I have a paper at work, referencing the Chinese governments estimates on how it expects Chinas food crops to reduce.

Ice Caps



http://www.wunderground.com/climate/SeaIce.asp?MR=1

There is a fairly linear trend line in the reduction of Artic Sea Ice, the Summer Ice of 2008 follows this trend in reduction. The summer of 2007 was way below this trend, and let me know if you figure out how or why, because it surprised everyone, completely unexpected. The summer ice of 2008, was larger than that of 2007, but the steady reduction of arctic sea ice continues, and shows no signs of slowing up.

ftp://sidads.colorado.edu//DATASETS/NOAA/G02135/Aug/N_08_plot.png

That link is just for one month, go to, http://nsidc.org/cgi-bin/bist/bist....r0=2009&mo1=09&year1=2009&.cgifields=no_panel and you can have acess to all the data that exists on sea ice extent since recording began.



I am not sure how that makes sense, if sea level has been rising for 10 000 years, shouldnt the sea level be much higher? But rhetoric aside, I dont really know what the sea level has been doing going back further than 1880. Never come up before and I never thought of asking. But for recent sea level rise, http://s238.photobucket.com/albums/ff250/BattleM00se/?action=view&current=Recent_Sea_Level_Rise.png.

Wow, and as always this ends up being more of an essay than a post, I hope you find it informative.

Interesting, thanks. Would you mind giving the original research papers of some of the images you gave (if possible)? Will have a read when I have some time.

 

[BattleMoose]

Certainly a fair request.

Problem is that I pulled these images from the great world wide web, and the reason is, because it is easy to do so. There is no google available for searching for images in pdfs, I "could" find these images in published articles but to find them, is a hellva chore, if you don't explicitly remember where you put them. But that aside, the images posted are reliable.

Ice Extent Images:

Comes from the National Snow and Ice Data Center. (There is no reason to doubt these guys)

Temperature Images:

Pulled from wikipedia, the models that are being displayed are listed and you are more than welcome to investigate them further. These projections commonly appear in the litereature relating to climate science. And remember, presenting fraudalent data is a very serious offence, and to check these projections as being reported correctly is incredibly easy.

Sea Level:

Also pulled from wikipedia.

Now, wikipedia shouldnt be relied for its reliability. The data in those images are consistent with what appears in the literature, and I encourage you to investigate them further.

 

[BandwidthAddict]

Arctic Ice Extent Understated Because of "Sensor Drift"

Interesting set of links off this Slashdot discussion:

http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/02/19/0420255

Note the prediction for an ice free 2008, and then the reality. That is the difference between alarmism (the prediction) and the science (reality).

It will be very interesting how this year plays out .. so far the summer has been much cooler than expected and I worry about a very cold winter. Although last year I predicted a very cold winter and was wrong so who knows.

The ice extents for this year seem to be better than last (meaning greater) but then there is that prediction thing again. The real science is to observe and try to understand. The discipline does not have sufficient understanding to make predictions yet (hence ice free vs reality).

 

[BattleMoose]

Note the prediction for an ice free 2008, and then the reality.

Would you kindly provide a reference for such a prediction. At most the article that you posted asked this question.

Taken together, an assessment of the available evidence, detailed below, points to another extreme September sea ice minimum. Could the North Pole be ice free this melt season? Given that this region is currently covered with first-year ice, that seems quite possible.

Because, what I quoted above, from the article you referenced, is most certainly not a prediction.

I am aware that there were individuals (scientists afaik) that were prediciting an ice free summer, based on, again, afaik, almost no data. Such a prediction is clearly non-scientific, even if it comes from a scientist.

So, if your going to use this to try and knock or discredit "science", your first going to have to find a reference for this being predicted by "science." Any source in the peer reviewed literature or prediction from a respected scientific body will do. I wish you luck, afaik, no such prediction exists.

The ice extents for this year seem to be better than last (meaning greater) but then there is that prediction thing again.

There is a consistent trend in the reduction of sea ice extent. Observing that, is one thing, making a prediction about the future is something completely different.

From what I recall, the general community is talking about an ice free summer in about 2030, perhaps sooner. Considering that the massive melt in 2007 came from absolutely nowhere demonstrates that there are forces at work that are clearly not understood. Again, this is not a formalised prediction at all.

The general trend in reduction of sea ice extent is fully expected, if not to increase due to positive feedback loops. That being said, no accurate prediction can be made for the sea ice extent of any specific year.

 

[BandwidthAddict]

Look at this:

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/03/...ming-around-to-natural-variability/#more-5994

Global warming may be on a hiatus for 30 years?

How could this be when the lord "god" Henson has said that warming will destroy this Earth?

How could this be when "greenhouse" gasses are increasing but temperatures decreasing?

How come the perfect models did not predict this?

 

[BandwidthAddict]

And the cracks begin to show:

http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=5416

I'd hope that this is the year that AGW finally dies as a threat to our economy but with all the politics and power plays it has staying power; even if glaciers were to start spreading across the world again, AGW would be reported as a great threat until the very last possible second of plausibility.

 

[BandwidthAddict]

Very interesting FLIR images:

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/03/04/looking-at-thermometer-placement-and-heat-in-the-infrared/