Ice Caps melting

[Mary Diamond]

Wow! What a topic for pirates to get involved in ~

I repeat, I am a strong supporter of the environment and conservation. I quit my high paying job in the city, and now just get by, working at a job in the green industry, where I can help educate the public. I drive a 13 year old vehicle that has always gotten 30 miles to the gallon. We recycle/reduce/re-use everything. My husband is a fleet manager in charge of 1400 vehicles - taking my cue, has converted his ENTIRE fleet to bio-diesel. Nagging pays - the garden center/landscape company I work at is going to be recycling everything (plant pots, pallets, as well as aluminum, paper and plastic) this year. The list goes on.

I acknowledge that humans play a large part in the many environmental problems seen today, and am working to do my part to reduce my impact every day.

However, there is a very basic rule which we humans, self-centered, short-lived and egotistical beings that we are, are forgetting: the Sun. The Earth is a living organism, of which we are a part. We need to take into consideration the Sun is going through change as well ~ some of which may impact us here on Earth, as well as other planets.

But, I am not a scientist. I'm a horticulturalist, and I hope every day that, by educating the people I come into contact with, I can make a small difference to improve the way we treat the Earth.

[oderlesseye]

and the plain old concrete jungle has done a number on the landscapes of earth overall.

It saddened me a few years back when returning by plane from the black hills of South Dakota ....flying over San Diego....While happy to be getting home...I was appauled at the site of the scar on the land scape I call home..

n sum, I am all for taking personal responsibility for your impact on the environment and educating others on how they can do likewise. I am against assigning that responsibility to a wastefully administrated bureaucracy based on the urgings of politically motivated people and organizations.

While I agree with this I think it's ludacris to go on living and waiting for a final outcome IE beach property in Arizona!

We really need a paradime shift to occure ifen we expect to reverse anything. Ultimatley I think This generation will be paying the price. The US is not imune to a famine for starters. So many ecological systems have been set out of balance that even the bee count has dropped dramatically. Bees mean food for poeple.we have truely entered into a downward spiral as a species if all the data is correct.

[Lady Alyx]

While I have never gone to the IPCC website. I do trust NOAA, and that is what I usually use as a reference. We build GOES satelites for them and I know they use these extensively to watch the planet. Here is their website you might like to read what they have to say.

Artic Report from NOAA

[Caraccioli]

While I have never gone to the IPCC website.  I do trust NOAA, and that is what I usually use as a reference.  We build GOES satelites for them and I know they use these extensively to watch the planet.  Here is their website you might like to read what they have to say.

Artic Report from NOAA

You're in support of the theory of anthropological GW having the potential to cause major environmental destruction and you've never been to the IPCC website?

I was looking at your linked page...interesting. From their report summary (I don't have time right now to review the whole thing):

"Taken collectively, the observations presented in this report indicate that during 2000-2005 the Arctic system showed signs of continued warming. However, there a few indications that certain elements may be recovering and returning to recent climatological norms (for example, the central Arctic Ocean and some wind patterns.)"

So, in some ways, they're saying it seems to be getting better. Notice that they restrict their comments to 2000-2005. Remember how the focus of Mr. Gore's movie on certain numbers dramatically altered the predictions?

Anyhow, they do go on...

"These mixed tendencies further illustrate the sensitivity and complexity of the Arctic physical system. They underlie the importance of maintaining and expanding [More money, please] efforts to observe and better understand this important component of the climate system to provide accurate predictions of its future state."

Here's something from the Temperature International Arctic Research Center, University of Alaska Fairbanks web page that you may find interesting.

"Despite the significant body of research and a preliminary understanding of driving mechanisms of the recent observed changes in the Arctic, there is still a large degree of uncertainty about the role of natural low-frequency variability and trends."

Once again, we are told by scientists that the complex system of the environment, even in this small area, is not fully understood. [More money, please.]

Now, on the satellites, they've only been collecting temperature data using satellites since the 1979. Even the NOAA website admits this. So we are looking at less than 30 years of data in what needs to be at least 1500 years of data, according to some scientists. (They believe that since the Earth's temperature has stabilized, it has gone through a roughly 1500 year temperature cycle. This is where all that Little Ice Age stuff comes to bear.)

Besides all this, who's to say that the ice cap melting is due largely to anthropological GW anyhow? From an article in National Geographic:

"In 2005 data from NASA's Mars Global Surveyor and Odyssey missions revealed that the carbon dioxide "ice caps" near Mars's south pole had been diminishing for three summers in a row." ( http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/20...rs-warming.html )

Of course, this all but dismisses the effects of the natural global warming effect, which, as I said previously, is definitely a factor in the temperature on Earth. However, it does hint that warming due to the sun may be increasing. (Although 3 years is a small window and much more data would be needed, it does happen to correspond with the 2000-2005 thing the website you cite mentioned.)

Something else that factors in with that time period is sunspot activity, which has a direct effect on the low-level cloud cover on Earth. This is sort of complex, but basically low-level clouds keep the Earth cooler (as jessie mentioned) by reflecting the sun's rays. During periods of increased sunspot activity there are fewer low level clouds and thus more solar radiation is allowed in which has a warming effect on our planet. Sunspot activity is on a roughly 11 year cycle and was at a maximum in late 2000/early 2001. (See for example: http://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0009/26sohospots/ )

In sum, the whole thing is very complex and not fully understood, which is even suggested by the NOAA. I still see no evidence that there will be 20 foot rises in sea level over the next 100 years from any of this.

[PyratePhil]

I realize this may not be on the same level that you folks are discussing, but I just heard a segment of "Earth and Sky" on NPR that spoke of early signs of spring being indicators of global warming...their data was collected from the last few decades in the US and Britain and showed a definite upward trending toward seeing the "first signs of spring" - robins, crocuses - earlier and earlier.

[Sir Beachem Quick]

The U.S. is doing the most in terms of polution control and china is doing the most in terms of creating polution. Experts are saying that if the entire globe went into sink now it would take 10,000 years to affect permanent changes. OK who's depressed show of hands plaese.

[Lady Alyx]

Sir Quick, sigh, I have to agree, we should have started at least in the 60's and 70's when any damaging affects to planet was being finally realized. They were saying by the time 2050 there are going to be many drought ridden plains and areas, including good ole sunny cal. I have noticed in the past 2 summers how extremly hot it has been. I have lived in the same house for 25 years and I can tell that the last 2 have been horribly hot to where I had to buy more fans. Usually people by the beach don't need them we have the breezes, but last summer I noticed that there where less breezes and stand still hot days. I can feel the heat rays coming through the roof yes the roof, I have an old house and have no attic so the ceiling upstairs is the roof.

I am not looking forward to this summer at all. I am going to buy yet another fan when they put them out on the shelves. Last year when the heat wave hit all the stores around the south bay where sold out, simply amazing.

[PyratePhil]

I can feel the heat rays coming through the roof yes the roof, I have an old house and have no attic so the ceiling upstairs is the roof.

Have you insulated the second floor ceiling? It's a one-time investment but ends up using a lot less energy than fans...

[Morgan Dreadlocke]

White reflective roof coatings can easily take off 10 degrees inside. Insulation would be a better investment if you ever plan to sell.

[Lady Alyx]

I rent so no upgrades!

[Caraccioli]

Sir Quick,  sigh, I have to agree, we should have started at least in the 60's and 70's when any damaging affects to planet was being finally realized.  They were saying by the time 2050 there are going to be many drought ridden plains and areas, including good ole sunny cal.

Who is saying that? If you read it in a newspaper or popular magazine, it's probably been blown out of proportion to what the studies actually say.

Most of the increased temperatures from the warming going on (natural cycles and any anthropological contributions) are expected to occur at night. This is true for all seasons in both hemispheres. And it's the winter temperatures that have shown the majority of the increased warming especially in colder locations. More than 75% of "global" warming in the Northern hemisphere for the last 50 years has been primarily confined to very cold high-pressure systems. (Michaels, et. al. 1998, 2000 and Balling et. al. 1998). According to one study (Jones, et. al. 1997a) of the temperature in central England - from which we have the longest running temperature record in the world - there has been a clear reduction in the number of cold days, but no clear increase in the number of hot days. (Jones, 1997a). For the US, the number of days with extreme high temperatures has actually declined a bit in the past 100 years.

As for the "predicted" droughts, it is likely that warming of the planet will actually produce more rain. Many scientiests are more concerned with flooding from a warming planet than droughts - in addition to increases in regular rain, there has been a marked rise in heavy rains in many places over the past few decades. According to surveys from the US and southern Canada, more rain recorded overall than previously over time. (IPCC report, 1996a). There is some concern that places already affected by drought may experience a bit more of it, but the same places will also experience more rain during rainy periods.

Interestingly, between the extra rain and the positive effects of CO2, the Earth is expected to be somewhat greener because of any warming that will take place. (I'll bet you haven't heard much about the positive effects of global warming. They don't make the news very often.) Most plants, especially rice and wheat, grow much better when there is more CO2 in the air. Add to this warmer winters and warmer evening temperatures and we have a greener planet.

As for insulation - I just put insulation in my second story which never had any! The house was built in 1911...all that energy wasted on unnecessary heating and cooling. I talked with neighbors and many of them say they found the same thing.

[Morgan Dreadlocke]

we should have started at least in the 60's and 70's when any damaging affects to planet was being finally realized. They were saying by the time 2050 there are going to be many drought ridden plains and areas, including good ole sunny cal.

In the 60's an 70's the tree huggers was ascreamin' bout smog and land subsidence in southern Cal. There was no talk of "Global Warming". Pedro ta Irvine was oil country. The oil fields was paved over fer millions 'o houses an any green ye be seein' is the result 'o human intervention ta put green where it don't want ta be. That me own observation from livin' there at that time. Now I lives in Arizona an the same patterns of idiocy be emergin'. The city can't expand cause they can't provide water ta the area. They buys up the surroundin' farm land fer its water rights then puts in resort developments an golf courses while hollerin' fer its citizens ta conserve water. The Fed withholds road construction money cause the state has too much dust in the air caused by unpaved roads. If my families water consumption went ta ZERO fer the next ten years it wouldna equal the water wasted by one construction company waterin' down its dusty acres as by EPA laws. This be happinin' across the street where a farmer be plowin' his fields wi' a ton 'o dust flyin'. I could be rantin' on an on but until the Fed gets a plan us little people are just spinnin our wheels.

Welcome ta the Arizona desert , full 'o bermuda grass, cottonwood trees an other nonnative species while the native plants get bulldozed under

(Rant mode off)

[CaptainSatan]

If Al Gore is so concerned about the enviroment why does he live in a mansion that uses 20 times more electricity than the average American home (according to the Nashville Electric Service)?

-CS

[Caraccioli]

Somewhere I have an article comparing Gore's Tennessee home (which is apparently pretty wastefully built and maintained) to George Bush's home (which uses all kinds of pro-environment energy devices like geothermal systems and wastewater recovery and whatnot). However, Gore is supposedly updating the house. (Well, if he wasn't before, he certainly will be now that the TVA report is out there.) The same article explains how much in environmental terms all the upgrades are going to cost.

Don't forget that Gore is paying carbon offsets (A sort of voluntary tax to assuage your guilt paid to a middleman company which funds environmental groups - naturally, only after taking the middleman company's cut for "administrative costs." Not that I'm skeptical or anything...) Yet Gore is paying it to Generation Investment Management LLP, the chairman and co-found of which is, guess who?, Al Gore.

Gore is running a political play for power. That's why I don't trust one thing the man says or does vis-a-vis the environment.

[Caraccioli]

So now there's a study out there that says the more trees we have above the 20th Northern Parallel, the more it contributes to Global Warming! (You can see the abstract for the report here.)

(Note that this is based partially on computer modeling, of which I am notably skeptical when it comes to complex systems like the environment.)

Apparently while tropical forests reduce global warming, trees north of the 20th North parallel absorb solar energy and cover solar-reflecting snow (which reduces GW). The researchers suggest that by 2100, northern forests will warm surface temps in their area by about 10 degrees F. Their model suggests that if all the forests were cut down, the global mean temperature would decrease by about .5 degrees.

Interestingly, trees are also responsible for contributing to global warming in another way: the emit water vapor. Water vapor is the largest component of the natural greenhouse gases. (WV is 1st, CO2 is 2nd and Methane is 3rd.) The thermal effect of the water vapor is more than ten times that of the carbon dioxide (CO2 is what the anthropological GW folks are hopping mad about - mostly, I suspect, because that will give them the greatest political leverage...and power). The thermal resistive or insulating properties of water vapor and carbon dioxide are almost identical. So the insulation of the earth (which is essentially what the greenhouse effect does) for water vapor might be even more troubling than that of carbon dioxide. And the trees are contributing!

(I can't help it. It just gets sillier and sillier.)

[Misson]

Ah, my research interests intersect! I thought this passage from W.R. Thrower's book, Life at Sea in the Age of Sail (1972 pre-dating Anthropological GW theories) was rather interesting on the topic of melting ice caps (and the interesting comments one must admit it makes about silly, complicated theories about recent industrial activity being a primary or even a large cause of climatic change).

"While the British confined their exploration to a possible north-west passage, the Dutch mainly concerned themselves with attempts to find an north-east passage to the Far East. While actively engaged in whaling, they had continually borne in mind the possibility of an alternative route to the Far East sailing directly over the Pole, and they did actually sail as far as the Pole itself. A trans-Polar sea route was nearly always obstructed by the ice of the Arctic Ocean. But owing to one of those inexplicable vagaries of climate [No, it's pre-industrial anthropological Global Warming! Cutting down all those trees to make ships! ], this ocean was free from ice for several years in the middle of the 17th century, and indeed it was full of waves reported at the time to resemble those in the Bay of Biscay. There is abundant evidence (e.g. Philosophical Transactions, 1675) that many Dutch whaling captains regularly reached very high latitudes; they not only reached the Pole but one ship even went two degrees beyond it. Comparisons made at the time between the logs of various ships confirmed the claims made." (Thrower, p. 9-10)

One can but wonder how polar bears survived such melting of the ice 300 years ago, not to mention wonder why all coastal areas were not under water.

[MadL]

WATER WORLD!

Where it be fun t' be a pirate!

But then on 'nother note; have ye seen "The Future Is Wild"?

They used computer models, much like weather men/women use to predict weather, and they took all the information we know about planet Earth and all we know about the animal and plant life and all the information we have gathered about weather patterns, Ice Ages, Global Warming, and the whole lot and mapped out what life on Earth will be like over the next 200 million years!

These computer models show we WILL have more ice ages, more global warming, then more ice ages, and there will be periods in between for sipping pina coladas as well.

Now of course they took one factor out of these model scenarios; No Humans. To take the chaos factor out of their predictions they had the human race put aboard flying pirate space ships and shuffled us off to another planet. So, even without humans, the planet went through these changes.

Now here is the best part; in 200 million years they predict that without human influence it will be Squids that become the dominant race. There will be small and intelligent ones that live in the trees and there will be giant dumb ones that lumber around on the ground. NOW, this is when I want to return - cuz I LOVE calamari!!!!!

oh, and just so we don't feel too out of place on the other planet they will be sending us to, also check out " Alien Planet"

[Rusty Barrels]

If we are going to stop global warming, then we have to have zero population growth on a global scale , and that my friends is not gonna happen.

[Morgan Dreadlocke]

Quit driving.

Quit eating.

Quit breathing.

Send all your money to Algore.

[Misson]

If we are going to stop global warming, then we have to have zero population growth on a global scale , and that my friends is not gonna happen.

And your (science-based) source for this proclamation?

A note about the computer models - they are far from complete or accurate. I believe I mentioned the failure to take cloud cover into account somewhere in a previous post (as my user ID Caraccioli). I would argue that we don't even have the ability to create a remotely accurate long range forecast of weather events on earth. (Some others would argue differently. GW is partially predicated on such arguments.)

Even the reports issued by the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) admit this somewhere in all that dense text they issue. (They are the ones generating most of the computer models you hear about.) The fact that they run and own up to multiple "possible scenarios" is quite telling IMO.

Interestingly (to me - another pet research topic), chaos mathematics was created in part from mathematical weather forecasting models. Edward Lorenz was trying to create such models of air movement when he began to notice that his mathematical weather patterns didn't change as predicted. Initial variables in his simple twelve variable computer weather model created grossly divergent weather patterns. This is the 'butterfly effect' you hear so much about. It shows just how complex the science of forecasting is.

[Mission]

Now this is absolutely fascinating. I've been reading 17th century English sailor journals for a couple years and noticing the odd weather they describe. A climatologist has decided to do this formally. Dr. Denis Wheeler is using 18th and 19th naval logs to examine temperatures and weather conditions from the period. You can read about it here.

"Ships’ logbooks were the main resource used to monitor the weather in the oceans. Officers on these ships kept careful records of the daily, and sometimes hourly, climate conditions. What that means today is modern researchers are able to find out what the weather was like anywhere in the world on a particular day, right through the Little Ice Age and back to 1750."

There should be a lot of interesting data on Arctic ice in the search for the northwest passage as well.

Based on my own reading, I doubt you'll hear much about this as I suspect it will fail to support the current supposition that modern carbon emissions are largely responsible for weather aberrations.

[hurricane]

And then you can always add in the unpredictable nature of the many pole reversals we've had, which have unknown effects on the climate.

Also had a climate chick at NASA tell me about the Arctic melting - put a couple ice cubes in a glass of water and see if the level changes - It's the places that have land masses underneath the ice and snow that have the most effect, not the ice (that was her take on it - I don't have the expertise to question it).

-- Hurricane

Edited October 19, 2009 by hurricane

[Mission]

Wow, geomagnetic pole reversal! Why have I never stumbled across this before? Fascinating...

From wiki:

"Through analysis of palaeomagnetic data, it is now known that the field has reversed its orientation tens of thousands of times since its formation very early on in earth history. With the increasingly accurate Global Polarity Timescale (GPTS) it has become apparent that the rate at which reversals occur has varied considerably throughout the past. During some periods of geologic time (e.g. Cretaceous Long Normal), the Earth's magnetic field is observed to maintain a single orientation for tens of millions of years. Other events seem to have occurred very rapidly, with two reversals in a span of 50,000 years. The last reversal was the Brunhes-Matuyama reversal approximately 780,000 years ago."

"Because the magnetic field has never been observed to reverse by humans with instrumentation, and the mechanism of field generation is not well understood, it is difficult to say what the characteristics of the magnetic field might be leading up to such a reversal. Some speculate that a greatly diminished magnetic field during a reversal period will expose the surface of the earth to a substantial and potentially damaging increase in cosmic radiation. However, Homo erectus and their ancestors certainly survived many previous reversals. There is no uncontested evidence that a magnetic field reversal has ever caused any biological extinctions."

[Quartermaster James]

OK who's depressed show of hands plaese.

But Sir Quick, I have maintained all along that depression is the only rational response to our modern world.