Posts tagged species extinction

Making life on earth a crap shoot.

http://priceofoil.org/2013/03/13/the-madness-of-exploiting-methane-hydrates/

“But here is the rub: we know we can’t burn all of the fossil fuel reserves, without causing climate chaos.

So the concept of burning a new type of carbon – methane hydrates – just seems madness from a climate perspective.

Furthermore, to make things worse: the risk of methane leakage into the atmosphere during extraction of hydrates will be a major problem……So we are now willingly exploiting a new resource of carbon, knowing it will lead to climate chaos. That seems madness to me.”

Climate Scientists Erring on the Side of Least Drama

http://www.skepticalscience.com/climate-scientists-esld.html

Posted on 30 January 2013 by dana1981

“A paper recently published in Global Environmental Change by Brysse et al. (2012)examined a number of past predictions made by climate scientists, and found that that they have tended to be too conservative in their projections of the impacts of climate change.  The authors thus suggest that climate scientists are biased toward overly cautious estimates, erring on the side of less rather than more alarming predictions, which they call “erring on the side of least drama” (ESLD).”

“The IPCC is an intergovernmental body. It is open to all member countries of the United Nations (UN) and WMO. Currently 195 countries are members of the IPCC. Governments participate in the review process and the plenary Sessions, where main decisions about the IPCC work programme are taken and reports are accepted, adopted and approved. The IPCC Bureau Members, including the Chair, are also elected during the plenary Sessions.” http://www.ipcc.ch/organization/organization.shtml#.URDDCqVNVsA

If these governments accept, adopt and approve the IPCC pronouncements, then by definition they are biased.  We should not be surprised that they favour the status quo.  Anything published that would tend to limit the flow of profits would necessarily be toned down.

Update of Greenland Ice Sheet Mass Loss: Exponential?

26 December 2012

James Hansen and Makiko Sato

http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2012/20121226_GreenlandIceSheetUpdate.pdf

In this paper, Hansen and Sato point out that the IPCC rise in sea level projections need updating.  As I understand it, the models used in the past did not take into consideration the possible – Hansen and Sato suggest that it is probable- non-linear increase in ice sheet loss due to human contributions to the rising global temperature due the greenhouse effect.  Sea level rises will most probably be far greater than the 1 meter mentioned by the IPCC.  Sadly, it will be too late to do anything about it when enough data is collected to convince reluctant sceptics.  I suggest that powers that refuse to change the status quo understand this and will at that time just shrug their shoulders and say, in effect, “Too late to do anything now, so let’s just keep on keeping on the way we have been and enjoy what we have while we have it.”  Of course, only the 1%ers will be enjoying their lives whilst the rest of us waste away in cold and hunger.  You don’t think this can happen?

Of course, what has not been mentioned is the question:  How will Gaia maintain stable, life enabling global temperature without glaciers and ice sheets?  The Gaia Theory plainly points out that the earth should be a lot warmer due to the expanding heat from an expanding sun over the last 5 billion years. We need to work hard to understand how Gaia operates and cooperate rather than destroy her enabling structures and global health measures.

“A crucial question is how rapidly the Greenland (or Antarctic) ice sheet can disintegrate in response to global warming. Earth’s history makes it clear that burning all fossil fuels would cause eventual sea level rise of tens of meters, thus practically wiping out thousands of cities located on global coast lines. However, there seems to be little political or public interest in what happens next century and beyond, so reports of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) focus on sea level change by 2100, i.e., during the next 87 years.”

“…future sea level rise of greatest concern is that from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, which has the potential to reach many meters. Hansen (2005) argues that, if business-as-usual increase of greenhouse gases continue throughout this century, the climate forcing will be so large that non-linear ice sheet disintegration should be expected and multi-meter sea level rise not only possible but likely.”

“Perceived authority2 in the case of ice sheets stems from ice sheet models used to simulate paleoclimate sea level change. However, paleoclimate ice sheet changes were initiated by weak climate forcings changing slowly over thousands of years, not by a forcing as large or rapid as human-made forcing this century.”

“The increasing Greenland mass loss in Fig. 1 can be fit just as well by exponentially increasing annual mass loss, a behavior that Hansen (2005, 2007) argues could occur because of multiple amplifying feedbacks as an ice sheet begins to disintegrate. A 10-year doubling time would lead to 1 meter sea level rise by 2067 and 5 meters by 2090. The dates are 2045 and 2057 for 5-year doubling time and 2055 and 2071 for a 7-year doubling time.”

Nation of Change

28/11/2012

Chris Hedges

http://www.nationofchange.org/stand-still-apocalypse-1354008355

“Humans must immediately implement a series of radical measures to halt carbon emissions or prepare for the collapse of entire ecosystems and the displacement, suffering and death of hundreds of millions of the globe’s inhabitants, according to a report commissioned by the World Bank. The continued failure to respond aggressively to climate change, the report warns, will mean that the planet will inevitably warm by at least 4 degrees Celsius (7.2 degrees Fahrenheit) by the end of the century, ushering in an apocalypse.

The 84-page document, “Turn Down the Heat: Why a 4°C Warmer World Must Be Avoided,” was written for the World Bank by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Climate Analytics and published last week. The picture it paints of a world convulsed by rising temperatures is a mixture of mass chaos, systems collapse and medical suffering like that of the worst of the Black Plague, which in the 14th century killed 30 to 60 percent of Europe’s population. The report comes as the annual United Nations Conference on Climate Change begins this Monday [Nov. 26] in Doha, Qatar.”

“The political and corporate elites in the industrialized world continue, in spite of overwhelming scientific data, to place short-term corporate profit and expediency before the protection of human life and the ecosystem. The fossil fuel industry is permitted to determine our relationship to the natural world, dooming future generations. Carbon dioxide (CO2), the main greenhouse gas, increased from its pre-industrial concentration of about 278 parts per million (ppm) to more than 391 ppm in September 2012, with the rate of rise now at 1.8 ppm per year. We have already passed the tipping point of 350 ppm; above that level, life as we have known it cannot be sustained. The CO2 concentration is higher now than at any time in the last 15 million years. The emissions of CO2, currently about 35 billion metric tons per year, are projected to climb to 41 billion metric tons per year by 2020.”