Killian, I’m not arguing the topic at hand. I’m just trying to understand your stance. It sounded in some of your posts like you were opposed to any kind of industrial/energy economy. But if you’re vision allows for 10-20% of current energy production, that’s something. That said, I am curious about how that allowance stands next to your statements that none of our current energy systems were sustainable under your definition (which correct or not is not, you have to grant, universally used).
I’ll follow up with a couple other thoughts after I get your response to this.
Killiansays
#191 Barton Paul Levenson said, But “sustainable” means you can keep on doing it for a reasonable period of time.
I disagree. How long is reasonable? Depends whom you ask. No, sustainable has to mean it can go on indefinitely excepting some external shock to the system, like an expanding sun.
#192 Barton Paul Levenson said, K: Pray tell: How do we raise consumption of 9 billion to “First World” standards of living when doing so is expected to use 3 (Europish) – 7 (American-ish) Earths worth of resources?
BPL: By finding other ways to provide a good standard of living.
“Good standard of living” isn’t typically meant as equal to a truly sustainable, low-consumption lifestyle. So if you have a proposed level of consumption you’d like to propose as sustainable and a “good standard”, please do.
I am certain a healthy, happy, abundant life can be had by 10 billion fairly easily, but it would not include most of what we do today. It thus makes little sense to use a term like “standard of living” when it is so closely associated with current practices. I suggest you should define this.
And is it possible for you to post without extreme scornful sarcasm
He said scornfully and sarcastically.
Yeah, sorry, but there was no scorn nor sarcasm. I seriously cannot see how a “good standard of living” as the term is currently associated is possible and was surprised you used the phrase, so I asked.
Remember, you can’t hear tone, nor can you know the frame of mind I was in when writing that. 60-70% of communication is non-verbal. Best not to assume then, no?
JJ — Shakhova recent trip was when?
It should appear in the list at http://www.iarc.uaf.edu/expeditions/
but I didn’t hear a year mentioned in any of the three videos Nick Breeze posted. It’s sometimes confusing whether she’s referring to the 2011 trip or something newer.
Overshoot may stand as the central text of the 20th century about the ecological fate of humankind. The book represents a missed opportunity in that so few people were able to hear what Catton had to say in 1980, and so few want to hear it now–even as the headlines are filled with the very precursors of the bottleneck he laments in his last major piece of writing.
I keep coming across people, young and old, who have just discovered his work for the first time.
Killiansays
Tipping points? Earlier in this thread the issue of social tipping points arose. Well, have a look at this:
Because I’m glad to know I’m not crazy, I was relieved to hear Jeremy Jackson (“the rise of slime”) say that “the dead-zonification of the coastal ocean” amounts to the reversal of 600 thousand years of evolution–back to “primordial brainless jellyfish” and predecessors. (current PBS series “Earth A New Wild / Episode Four: Oceans”)
The TED talk wastes no time. It’s about industrialization, pollution, and climate change. We have reached the era of ocean-bottom removal, so to speak.
Given the increasing doubts of the reliabilty of global emissions control as a means to respect the arbitrary 2.0C threshold of dangerous climate destabilization, I was surprised not to see more discussion here of the recent NAS report on geoengineering.
The report is not explicit in describing those doubts as the justification for Geo-E research, implying instead the default explanation of the need for it being “in case we fail to achieve timely emissions control,” which seems to me both self-censored and self-defeating as an argument to get research under way.
As evidence of those doubts across the scientific community two references may suffice.
First, the IPCC’s AR5 set as its best case of feasible emissions control a scenario that offered only a 66% chance of respecting the 2.0C threshold.
Second, the paper by Ramanathan et al in January 2014 : http://www.pnas.org/content/111/9/3322.abstract – This is a study of the satellite record of Arctic sea ice loss since ’79 that describes the resulting Albedo Loss feedback as imposing a warming equal on average to 25% of the warming from anthro-CO2 stocks during the period. This is roughly equal to a new China’s-worth of annual emissions and, given the progress of the Arctic sea ice loss, it is plainly on a strongly rising trend. Being substantially driven by the influx of waters from the warmed oceans’ temperature as well as by warmer air masses, there seems no reason to suppose that the suppression of the sea ice would be halted under Emissions Control alone until the oceans eventually returned to their former temperature.
The decline of Arctic sea ice is of course only a part of the ongoing Cryosphere decline and non-linear global albedo loss,
– and there are the 7 other Major Interactive Feedbacks [MIFs] reported to be accelerating of which 6 are also non-linear,
– and over 80 ‘direct coupling mechanisms’ driving the MIFs’ current acceleration are identifiable in the literature,
– as are the forthcoming indirect couplings due to the MIFs’ timelagged contributions to realized SAT warming.
Given a best case of Emissions Control of say near-zero GHG output by 2050, with the last phase-out emissions’ warming plus the warming unveiled by the closure of the ‘fossil sulphate parasol’ being timelagged out to the 2080s, we should see around 70 years of continuous warming driving the feedbacks’ acceleration potentially far past the point of fully offsetting out best efforts at Emissions Control.
From this perspective it seems to me that the application of the Albedo Restoration mode of Geo-E is inevitably going to be applied,
– either as a well-researched preventive measure before the onset of serial global crop failures and their resulting geopolitical destabilization,
– or as a hasty emergency measure after the onset of serial global crop failures using whatever technique is predictably effective for cooling and can be swiftly deployed – which at present points to the cheap, dirty and dangerous option of stratospheric sulphate aerosols.
Perhaps the most dubious argument commonly used against the research of reliably benign means of Albedo Restoration (restoration back to an appropriate previous natural level) is that because it doesn’t address anthro-CO2 stocks the intensity would have to be continually raised to keep pace with BAU rise of CO2 outputs and it would have to be maintained for thousands of years to avoid an abrupt global heating as the huge GHG potential was unveiled.
Having had Google provide links to every English-Language article worldwide on geoengineering for the last two years, I’ve yet to see a single quote from any scientist or politician of standing proposing the use of the Albedo Restoration in isolation, that is without both Emissions Control and the Carbon Recovery mode of Geo-E being operated alongside it in a ‘troika; strategy. The real function of that dubious argument is thus to publicly demean the user’s integrity.
While I’d be very interested to hear what peoples’ preferred criteria would be for selecting Albedo Restoration proposals as candidates for well supervised research and trials, it is worth noting that with only one planet of which to run said trials, and with the need of a decade or more of observations to verify effects, the various candidate proposals will presumably have to be ranked into a sequence, with each being researched in turn up to the point of rejection.
This indicates one of the immutable reasons for the cordination and supervision of the research program being under a globally mandated scientific agency – while the potential of any unilateral or bilateral deployment to trigger warfare similarly indicates that to be sustainable any deployment will have to be by the collective decision of the member states of the UN. A further consideration is that any reduction of states’ ambition on Emissions Control should be precluded by the stipulation that no such decision to deploy is valid until a credibly stringent Emissions Control treaty has come into force.
Though this reliance on the UN as the authority over the RD&D of both modes of Geo-E may anathema to the right wing in America, it is actually strictly practical, as they would logically be still more opposed to China, Russia or say Iran developing Geo-E research without that constraint, co-ordination and supervision of their programs.
I should be interested to hear others’ views on the issue of appropriate governance as well as on just what co-benefits might be gained from this necessarily massive supra-national research effort.
Regards,
Lewis
Jasper Jaynessays
Hank#203,
” 203.JJ — Shakhova recent trip was when?
It should appear in the list at http://www.iarc.uaf.edu/expeditions/
but I didn’t hear a year mentioned in any of the three videos Nick Breeze posted. It’s sometimes confusing whether she’s referring to the 2011 trip or something newer.”
In #198, I stated May 2014. As I remember from the video, she stated late April-early May 2014.
There are many researchers generating climate models at varying levels of detail and quality, and some include limited numbers of carbon cycle feedbacks. The models and results used for policy purposes, by governments, industry, and major mitigation proposers, tend to be those from the IPCC reports. The following link is typical of many that have analyzed the IPCC reports/models, and identified some of the shortcomings relating to carbon cycle feedback modeling. http://www.gci.org.uk/CBAT1_i-9b.html
James McDonaldsays
According to Cook et al, and other surveys of the literature, only a few dozen peer-reviewed papers in the past 20 years have rejected the premise of AGW.
Which leads me to wonder if anyone has done a study evaluating those papers. For example, can one characterize their level of competence and accuracy? How many were explicitly repudiated by subsequent papers? How many made predictions that can since be tested, and were they correct? Have the positions of the authors of those papers evolved over the past decade?
To oversimplify, I guess I’m asking to what extent those papers constitute a source of credible scientific argument, and to what extent are they problematic or even demonstrably incorrect.
Note: Despite whatever bias might be perceived in my question, I’m not pushing any agenda here — it’s a genuine question, which I can’t presume to answer for myself.
My thanks to anyone who can provide some pointers or insight…
“Good standard of living” isn’t typically meant as equal to a truly sustainable, low-consumption lifestyle. So if you have a proposed level of consumption you’d like to propose as sustainable and a “good standard”, please do.
BPL: A permanent, comfortable home. Adequate groceries. Either a good job or a reasonable income. Safety from oppression and violence.
K: {BPL: And is it possible for you to post without extreme scornful sarcasm}
He said scornfully and sarcastically.
Yeah, sorry, but there was no scorn nor sarcasm.
BPL: You need to go back and read your post again. I found it hostile and offensive. I’m not looking for an apology, but you really, really need to review how you’re coming across.
K: So if you have a proposed level of consumption you’d like to propose as sustainable and a “good standard”, please do.
BPL: A comfortable home, adequate groceries, a job or a sufficient income, and freedom from violence and oppression.
K: Yeah, sorry, but there was no scorn nor sarcasm.
BPL: I found your post extremely offensive and needlessly hostile. I’m not looking for an apology, but you need to review how you’re coming across. I don’t care what your intent was, you were out of line. I can’t read your mind, but I can certainly read what you write, and how you write it.
“OMG. The comment was related to climate change in the early 1900’s.”
It seems pretty clear that you are using words, but your thinking is so muddled by lack of understanding that your words convey very little meaning.
You want things to happen quickly, yet it all has to be permaculture, which is slow and painstaking. I think you had better just drop climate from you interests and see if you can work on social aspects of permaculture which may not require much quantitative thinking. Permaculture has been its own reward for quite a few people and you may find success in broadening that.
” Still plenty there considering the feedbacks you seem to think are ignored.
If you use the RC search tool you’ll find discussion of several such models.”
You are regurgitating massive amounts of data, and confusing data with information. Show me one study (of the many that have been referenced in RC) that examines the consequences of mitigation or BAU and uses a model that includes all the major carbon cycle feedbacks. I’m thinking of studies like the Price-Waterhouse, the IEA, IPCC, etc. I can’t think of one that incorporates these major feedbacks.
Ray Ladburysays
Killian: “No, sustainable has to mean it can go on indefinitely excepting some external shock to the system, like an expanding sun.”
This is why no one listens to you. You insist on solving the problem all at once or not at all. Given those two options, guess which will wind up happening.
The perfect is the enemy of the good, and in order to have good options we would have had to get started on the solutions 30 years ago when it became clear to the reality based community that we had a problem. We’re out of good options. We’re looking for acceptable solutions, where acceptable means they don’t result in collapse of civilization, ecological catastrophe, economic meltdown or massive human dieback. Those are the realities, and they are getting worse because the American people and their representatives still do not have the courage to accept those realities. Maybe your efforts might be more fruitful if you preach to the recalcitrant rather than the choir. But not everyone has the courage to do that, either.
“The United States says it will expand air-quality monitoring at some overseas diplomatic missions, following several years of reporting pollution data in China.
Rutgers vs. Maas on this year’s weather. “Rutgers University climate scientist Jennifer Francis and colleagues link that wavy jet stream to a warming Arctic, where climate changes near the top of the world are happening faster than in Earth’s middle latitudes.” Maas says no.
—–
> JJ
” Show me one study (of the many that have been referenced in RC) that examines the consequences of mitigation or BAU and uses a model that includes all …”
Notice the moving goalposts?
First you say there’s no such study. Then you say there are too many studies for you to read. Then you insist the only acceptable study would be one that includes your talking points.
Nope. What I pointed to is not “regurgitated” –that sort of reference material is what your librarian will help you find if you’ll only ask for help. The effort of thinking about it, that’s something either you have to do, or you have to decide who you trust for it (and cite your source).
Prove me wrong
Yes prove me wrong
That’s all I have to say
Cause my position’s not too strong
You might think I’d have some facts to help my argument along
But I don’t
So you’ll just have to prove me wrong.
Hank Robertssays
PS for JJ
— let me make my reply to you as clear as I can.
Yes, of course, there are “shortcomings relating to carbon cycle feedback modeling.” That’s how science works!
You began by asserting there’s no such work.
You’re backing slowly toward the obvious: we’re working with incomplete information.
Claiming that we don’t know everything so we can’t decide anything is just another serving of Curry. You know better.
Accept that we _can_ work with incomplete information; then you’ll be in the middle along with the rest of us kibitzers here in the peanut gallery, and we can continue learning about the climate science.
JM, Lindzen had a legitimate theory, c. 1982, that a “tropical cirrus cloud infrared iris” might counteract global warming. However, satellite observations shot it down. He published essentially the same paper in 1992, 2002, and 2010, with similar results. Like Halton Arp in astronomy, he has become a laughingstock because of his inability to let go of his pet theory.
#191 BP Levenson: “[M]eans you can keep on doing it for a reasonable period of time.”
#202 Killian: [I]t can go on indefinitely excepting some external shock to the system [].”
This sounds pretty close to me, like on the main, you do agree (but like to disagree). ;)
Sustainable definition from Wiktionary: Able to be produced or sustained for an indefinite period without damaging the environment, or without depleting a resource; renewable. [link]
‘reasonable’ suggestion: long enough to adapt to changing conditions (boundaries, parameters, impacts) keeping the system in or bringing it back to equilibrium and not stressing its limits (especially not tens at the same time like today) until it faces conditions the system can`t avoid, handle or alter by itself (hard limits).
As in this physical world everything that comes into or stays in existence is the result of the exchange of energy on various levels, it shows that the term ‘sustainable’ is a relational, not an absolut one. The usefulness of it depends thereon where we set the limits to take into consideration. It`s more like ‘sustainable up to’… (event X).
Sustainable in our world:
– Universe is not – it`s cooling out by expansion.
– galaxies are not – they are running out of fusionable matter for new stars and pesky black holes sucking up all and collisions with other galaxies tear them apart;
– black holes are (probably) not – because they radiate some of the matter back into space as energy;
– sun is not – as fusion fuel runs out;
-> so earth is not, as it is affected by most of above.
-> so life on earth isn’t; – your body isn`t – life ??? – space colonies, anyone?
Conditions for life on earth have been sustainable since around 1,2 bn yrs, but for 99,99x % of species they haven`t.
My frigde is empty every few days and my stomach doesn`t care about the hole in my pocket. Damn! :)
For every system in existence there are always hard limits to take into consideration.
(That`s why ‘sustainable growth‘ is an oxymoron.)
Not sure what you mean by ‘the IPCC,’ since the Assessment Reports are in effect gigantic syntheses, or reviews, of the recent published literature. As such, they don’t have just one methodology. But AR5 certainly cites many studies using ESMs–“Earth System Models”, which incorporate carbon cycle feedbacks.
Are you thinking that the sort of study you propose would be easy to implement? It seems to me that the work is still at a less-advanced stage than that. As AR5 WG1 says on page 514:
“Confidence in the magnitude, and sometimes even the sign, of many of these feedbacks between climate and carbon and other biogeochemical cycles is low.”
IOW, the brush is still being cleared from the field of inquiry.
Hey… This websites article about climate change started a really bad panic attack. It said it we failed and it’s to late for us. Is it just tabloid BS and could anyone direct me to sights to get accurate new?
(http://www.vox.com/2014/4/22/5551004/two-degrees)
R: Another Republican climate blog bites the dust !
BPL: [Nelson Muntz voice:] HA ha!
Jasper Jaynessays
Hank#219-220,
” Notice the moving goalposts?”
The goalposts have not moved one inch! I stand by my statement: Show me one study (of the many that have been referenced in RC) that examines the consequences of mitigation or BAU and uses a model that includes all the major carbon cycle feedbacks. Your regur$gitation of research papers with carbon feedback in the title is a ‘cover’ for your inability to show even ONE study that would refute my statement. The fact that the serious studies being used by governments, industry, and researchers like Anderson et al (to predict the consequences of mitigation or lack thereof) are not incorporating these feedback outputs of hundreds of researchers should be sending you a loud and clear message.
These omitted major carbon feedbacks (some of which are described in the links I provided to you) are potentially very significant. As Shakhova stated in her interviews I referenced, there are sufficient carbon reserves and sufficient pathways through which they can be released to cause major damage for the one source she discussed. Add in the effects of the other sources, and their cro$ss-coup$ling, and it becomes obvious that the omissions could be extremely significant.
There is a belief, being propounded by the commenters on RC and other similar sites, that geo-engineering is the Russian Roul$ette approach to saving the biosphere, and that the mitigation being pro$pounded has much less uncertainty. In the prior Holocene range, this may be true. However, we have already committed to temperature increases on the order of 2 C, well outside the Holocene. The effects of the mitigation proposed, evaluated using present models without carbon feedbacks, have similar uncertainties to geo-engineering in these higher temperature ranges. In reality, mitigation is another form of geo-engineering, where we are conducting global experiments that will modify the climate without any hard understanding of the consequences. Label it what you will, ‘doom$er’ or otherwise, but the feedback-light models that have been used to estimate future consequences have not convinced me at all that we can avoid extinction based on what we have done to the climate already, much less what we are projecting to do to the climate.
Ct (228): Hey… This websites article about climate change started a really bad panic attack. It said it we failed and it’s to late for us. Is it just tabloid BS and could anyone direct me to sights to get accurate new?
(http://www.vox.com/2014/4/22/5551004/two-degrees)
BPL: The report is pretty much accurate. I myself just submitted an article (which has NOT passed peer review yet) to Am. J. Clim. Change predicting that global agriculture will collapse completely around the year 2028, with big error bars, depending on our rate of CO2 emissions. Remember you heard it here first.
That article was written before the US-China Accord on emissions control. Likely the conference in Paris this year will will yield commitments that need much less further tweaking to keep under 2 C than at present. And, there are many way to do even better than that.
I couldn’t see the figure in Stanford et al. (2014), from which the figure in that article is adapted, clearly enough to check for a mistake, but RCP 4.5 is roughly the 2 C path so the 2.4 C in the figure may be a transcription error or a mistake in the original. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Representative_Concentration_Pathways#Projections_based_on_the_RCPs It may be in the original since Stanford et al.’s first page did not seem to acknowledge that RCP 4.5 is the 2 C pathway.
JJ (230): Show me one study (of the many that have been referenced in RC) that examines the consequences of mitigation or BAU and uses a model that includes all the major carbon cycle feedbacks.
BPL: This is a serious suggestion. If you feel there’s a deficiency of such studies, why not write one up yourself? I’ll help if you need it. Seriously, build a model, run it, see what you get. Submit it to a journal.
JJ, the AMEG “methane emergency” hasn’t got support. That’s the feedback you insist belongs in your narrow definition of a satisfactory model, which you want someone to find for you. If you’d read the prior history here you’d know. Use the search box.
I think it would make sense to have an “Alberta Free” label for potato chips, beef, bread and the like so that people who want to boycott Albertan products can do so easily.
Here’s a nice précis of a recent piece in “Global Change Biology” looking at mitigation potential for Ag, Forest & Land Use (AFOLU.)
(You’re welcome, Killian.)
Mischievously, I want to especially credit those ‘ideologues’ and ‘fossil fuel enablers’ at Cleantechnica for pulling together the summary and the infographic.
One of the things we will analyse is the isotopic signature in the methane, which is a bit like taking the fingerprint of the air samples. Different sources of methane (CH4) have different fractions of the carbon-13 isotope (carbon with 7 neutrons instead of the more common 6), so by measuring how much carbon-13 is in a sample you can tell if it’s from biological sources like wetlands, or from other sources like fossil fuels.
…. These instruments on-board the aircraft will help us to see the bigger picture, to try and scale up the detailed local measurements and see what impact the Arctic has on methane worldwide. We will use computer models to help us do this, alongside the measurements.
…
As much as we want to make super precise and accurate measurements, we still have to go out in to the real world to get the data, and we all know how messy the real world can be! But dealing with that is part of the job, and part of the fun of it.
Find out more about how we’re getting on in the field by following this blog and listening to audio diaries at the Barometer podcast http://thebarometer.podbean.com.
–Dr Michelle Cain, University of Cambridge. Find me on twitter @civiltalker, and occasionally blogging at civiltalker.wordpress.com.
Does anyone know where I can find line strengths (HITRAN style or otherwise) on-line? I’ve just spent an hour searching Google for the line strength of the CO2 667.38 cm-1 line without any success whatsoever. I was kind of surprised.
Ray Ladburysays
Jasper Jaynes,
OK, let me get this straight. You are taking the scientific community to task for not including all the possible feedbacks into models, despite the fact that most of the feedbacks you are asking for are highly uncertain and don’t seem to be necessary for getting climate models to agree pretty well with reality.
And then you are trumpeting geoengineering as a solution, despite the fact that the forcings and feedbacks on which all proposed geoengineering solutions rely are the most uncertain factors in models as they currently exist. Do you maybe see a problem with your reasoning here? Anyone? Beuller?
Concerned teensays
(232)
Ok that’s good to know, you the PA is calming down now.
Killian wrote: “… sustainable has to mean it can go on indefinitely excepting some external shock to the system, like an expanding sun.”
Arguing about the true meaning of “sustainable” is completely irrelevant to anthropogenic global warming, which is an urgent, short-term, specific, technical problem, which must be solved within YEARS, not decades or generations or centuries — or there simply will not be any “indefinitely” for us to worry about.
Susan Andersonsays
Dear Concerned Teen:
Your worries reflect the worries of a lot of us. It’s a hard lesson to swallow, but despair and apathy feed the problem. I would suggest you find local people working on developing clean energy sources and ways to store and deliver that energy on the one hand, and to defeat the political effort to hide from reality. 350.org is one good place, but there are a host of local organizations. In Massachusetts, for example, there is MCAN. Many of these people, along with artists and many other concerned citizens, are working to solve problems.
One place is “start here” on this blog. This community was formed to provide the service mentioned in the masthead “Climate Science from Climate Scientists” and is a bit sophisticated to even fairly scientifically informed laypeople like myself. It does, however, give you direct access to some of the best experts on the planet.
A lot of information is available on any subject on Wikipedia, and they have so far been able to keep the deception industry from dominating their articles. You will find the arguments in their discussion sections.
You can check answers to common questions and find resources at http://www.skepticalscience.com
(you will find this is insulted and attacked at every turn, but this is because they do a good job of collecting the information in one place with many links to original work)
The news is not good, but there are things you can do, rather than channeling your worries in isolation. Our government needs to become more accountable to reality rather than to money in politics.
Being in community and working towards solutions is the best cure for panic, and you might make some new friends as well.
In addition, there is a large industry bent on persuading you that science is a big conspiracy and continued use of more and more fossil is the only option. If there is one bit of advice we could offer, it is not so much where to go (though NASA and all other legitimate scientific sources offer a variety of materials that are interesting and shed light on the subject) as where not to go. Popular websites such as Wattsupwiththat, ClimateAudit, ClimateDepot and others work hard to attack scientists, while pretending to be skeptical. Skepticism is open-minded, so you can spot them because they lack any curiosity as to whether there is anything to be learned from the worldwide scientific community outside their carefully selected experts. Some of these outliers sound pretty good. The attacks are relentless and well organized; keep in mind that big fossil are the wealthiest industries on earth and have hired some massively clever people to create an infrastructure that mirrors the real thing (NIPCC, Heartland, Cato Institute, ALEC and on and on).
DeSmogblog also provides background on some of these “climate villains”.
I’m sorry about this extensive side trip into the negative side, but you will find many many people believe politics is more important than reality, and it is necessary to be warned to head for the mainstream sites first.
Hank Robertssays
Watch this link for DSCOVR imagery: http://dscovr.space/
(A volunteer group planning to archive the imagery and keep it available and assemble snapshots into video form)
When?
“… It takes 115 days to reach orbit in L-1 or Lagrange 1 point. NASA will likely hand over DSCOVR to NOAA in mid-summer timeframe.
… Improvements were made in all narrow-length wavelength bands to reduce stray light and to add new cloud height measurements. Ozone, aerosols, cloud amount, and vegetation were all in original design. Wavelength changes were made based on other earth-observing satellites over the last 15 years. Earth science data will be obtained about every 2 hours and downloaded to earth whenever the large Wallops Island antenna is in view.” http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/qa-on-noaas-dscovr-mission/
SecularAnimistsays
I think this is a well-written article by Dr. Jennifer Francis on the connections between Arctic warming, the Jet Stream, and “weird weather” — including the record-breaking cold that is punishing the Eastern USA this week:
“OK, let me get this straight. You are taking the scientific community to task for not including all the possible feedbacks into models, despite the fact that most of the feedbacks you are asking for are highly uncertain and don’t seem to be necessary for getting climate models to agree pretty well with reality.”
JJ: I don’t know that I’m “taking them to task”. I’m commenting that the models don’t contain key terms/phenomena that may kick in with a vengeance somewhere between 1-2 C. I raised the issue to get some input on why they don’t contain such terms. There are many potential reasons, including the one you raised.
In Unforced Variations, January 2015, #195, I quoted the following excerpt from an article that Hank had posted:
” “The physical knowledge that too-tall cliffs fail is very old and familiar to every miner or quarry-worker. The physical knowledge that ice is not the strongest rock on the planet is also rather old. And, the suggestion that cliff failure could affect West Antarctic stability dates back to 1962,” Alley wrote.”
And then I commented as follows:
“So, ‘cliff failure’ is many decades old, and hydrofracturing is not exactly a new topic. Yet, these physical processes, which could provide a much better picture of how precarious our climate situation really is, are only now being inserted into the ice models?”
So, is this happening in incorporation of the positive feedback mechanisms as well, or is the challenge limited to what you describe? Seems to me a topic for discussion on a climate science blog.
“And then you are trumpeting geoengineering as a solution, despite the fact that the forcings and feedbacks on which all proposed geoengineering solutions rely are the most uncertain factors in models as they currently exist. Do you maybe see a problem with your reasoning here? Anyone? Beuller?”
JJ: My ‘trumpeting’ of geo-engineering is pure delusion on your part. I categorized mitigation as part of geo-engineering to emphasize the common features of each. In both cases, we are conducting global experiments whose consequences we can’t predict, especially when the temperatures start to rise past prior Holocene experience. And, BAU falls into the category of global experiments whose consequences we can’t predict as well.
JJ: I’ll end with a discussion of the last clause of your first paragraph above.
“don’t seem to be necessary for getting climate models to agree pretty well with reality”
I am surprised at you, Ray, for such a poorly considered statement. Climate models may be agreeing well with reality, but that reality so far is within the confines of prior Holocene temperatures, where the physics is relatively well known. The feedbacks may become important when we start to leave prior Holocene, and the physics necessary to describe climate phenomena becomes more complex (and uncertain).
Concered Teen
I get what you mean but I doubt the future will be that bleak. Most news articles make it sound like their is nothing being done but that is not the case at all. Things are being done. Deals being cut wind farms being built and even BP oil has given climate input that’s basically a carbon tax or the closest thing that the republicans will let pass.
Killian, I’m not arguing the topic at hand. I’m just trying to understand your stance. It sounded in some of your posts like you were opposed to any kind of industrial/energy economy. But if you’re vision allows for 10-20% of current energy production, that’s something. That said, I am curious about how that allowance stands next to your statements that none of our current energy systems were sustainable under your definition (which correct or not is not, you have to grant, universally used).
I’ll follow up with a couple other thoughts after I get your response to this.
#191 Barton Paul Levenson said, But “sustainable” means you can keep on doing it for a reasonable period of time.
I disagree. How long is reasonable? Depends whom you ask. No, sustainable has to mean it can go on indefinitely excepting some external shock to the system, like an expanding sun.
#192 Barton Paul Levenson said, K: Pray tell: How do we raise consumption of 9 billion to “First World” standards of living when doing so is expected to use 3 (Europish) – 7 (American-ish) Earths worth of resources?
BPL: By finding other ways to provide a good standard of living.
“Good standard of living” isn’t typically meant as equal to a truly sustainable, low-consumption lifestyle. So if you have a proposed level of consumption you’d like to propose as sustainable and a “good standard”, please do.
I am certain a healthy, happy, abundant life can be had by 10 billion fairly easily, but it would not include most of what we do today. It thus makes little sense to use a term like “standard of living” when it is so closely associated with current practices. I suggest you should define this.
And is it possible for you to post without extreme scornful sarcasm
He said scornfully and sarcastically.
Yeah, sorry, but there was no scorn nor sarcasm. I seriously cannot see how a “good standard of living” as the term is currently associated is possible and was surprised you used the phrase, so I asked.
Remember, you can’t hear tone, nor can you know the frame of mind I was in when writing that. 60-70% of communication is non-verbal. Best not to assume then, no?
JJ — Shakhova recent trip was when?
It should appear in the list at http://www.iarc.uaf.edu/expeditions/
but I didn’t hear a year mentioned in any of the three videos Nick Breeze posted. It’s sometimes confusing whether she’s referring to the 2011 trip or something newer.
Oh, wait, this seems to be a report of the latest Shakhova trip:
http://www.ice-arc.eu/wp-content/uploads/sites/22/2014/07/ICE-Tiksi-2014-submitted.pdf
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_ylo=2014&q=shakhova+expedition+2014
Discussed here some months ago.
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v7/n1/abs/ngeo2007.html
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?cites=3246396335730256438
wili, thanks for the pointer to the remembrance of Catton and his work.
I keep coming across people, young and old, who have just discovered his work for the first time.
Tipping points? Earlier in this thread the issue of social tipping points arose. Well, have a look at this:
48 percent of Republicans back government action on Climate Change
#193 zebra says, Since this topic is going on, I’d like to make a suggestion to Killian et al.
I don’t think that is a useful metric and don’t believe I have used it in this thread.
On de-evolution:
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-yYJPrLBr4GM/T8U3h2Seb2I/AAAAAAAApbY/gilmh2I5ows/s640/evolution.jpg
Jeremy Jackson, the TED talk:
https://www.ted.com/talks/jeremy_jackson
Because I’m glad to know I’m not crazy, I was relieved to hear Jeremy Jackson (“the rise of slime”) say that “the dead-zonification of the coastal ocean” amounts to the reversal of 600 thousand years of evolution–back to “primordial brainless jellyfish” and predecessors. (current PBS series “Earth A New Wild / Episode Four: Oceans”)
The TED talk wastes no time. It’s about industrialization, pollution, and climate change. We have reached the era of ocean-bottom removal, so to speak.
At the end he says what there is to fix.
Given the increasing doubts of the reliabilty of global emissions control as a means to respect the arbitrary 2.0C threshold of dangerous climate destabilization, I was surprised not to see more discussion here of the recent NAS report on geoengineering.
The report is not explicit in describing those doubts as the justification for Geo-E research, implying instead the default explanation of the need for it being “in case we fail to achieve timely emissions control,” which seems to me both self-censored and self-defeating as an argument to get research under way.
As evidence of those doubts across the scientific community two references may suffice.
First, the IPCC’s AR5 set as its best case of feasible emissions control a scenario that offered only a 66% chance of respecting the 2.0C threshold.
Second, the paper by Ramanathan et al in January 2014 : http://www.pnas.org/content/111/9/3322.abstract – This is a study of the satellite record of Arctic sea ice loss since ’79 that describes the resulting Albedo Loss feedback as imposing a warming equal on average to 25% of the warming from anthro-CO2 stocks during the period. This is roughly equal to a new China’s-worth of annual emissions and, given the progress of the Arctic sea ice loss, it is plainly on a strongly rising trend. Being substantially driven by the influx of waters from the warmed oceans’ temperature as well as by warmer air masses, there seems no reason to suppose that the suppression of the sea ice would be halted under Emissions Control alone until the oceans eventually returned to their former temperature.
The decline of Arctic sea ice is of course only a part of the ongoing Cryosphere decline and non-linear global albedo loss,
– and there are the 7 other Major Interactive Feedbacks [MIFs] reported to be accelerating of which 6 are also non-linear,
– and over 80 ‘direct coupling mechanisms’ driving the MIFs’ current acceleration are identifiable in the literature,
– as are the forthcoming indirect couplings due to the MIFs’ timelagged contributions to realized SAT warming.
Given a best case of Emissions Control of say near-zero GHG output by 2050, with the last phase-out emissions’ warming plus the warming unveiled by the closure of the ‘fossil sulphate parasol’ being timelagged out to the 2080s, we should see around 70 years of continuous warming driving the feedbacks’ acceleration potentially far past the point of fully offsetting out best efforts at Emissions Control.
From this perspective it seems to me that the application of the Albedo Restoration mode of Geo-E is inevitably going to be applied,
– either as a well-researched preventive measure before the onset of serial global crop failures and their resulting geopolitical destabilization,
– or as a hasty emergency measure after the onset of serial global crop failures using whatever technique is predictably effective for cooling and can be swiftly deployed – which at present points to the cheap, dirty and dangerous option of stratospheric sulphate aerosols.
Perhaps the most dubious argument commonly used against the research of reliably benign means of Albedo Restoration (restoration back to an appropriate previous natural level) is that because it doesn’t address anthro-CO2 stocks the intensity would have to be continually raised to keep pace with BAU rise of CO2 outputs and it would have to be maintained for thousands of years to avoid an abrupt global heating as the huge GHG potential was unveiled.
Having had Google provide links to every English-Language article worldwide on geoengineering for the last two years, I’ve yet to see a single quote from any scientist or politician of standing proposing the use of the Albedo Restoration in isolation, that is without both Emissions Control and the Carbon Recovery mode of Geo-E being operated alongside it in a ‘troika; strategy. The real function of that dubious argument is thus to publicly demean the user’s integrity.
While I’d be very interested to hear what peoples’ preferred criteria would be for selecting Albedo Restoration proposals as candidates for well supervised research and trials, it is worth noting that with only one planet of which to run said trials, and with the need of a decade or more of observations to verify effects, the various candidate proposals will presumably have to be ranked into a sequence, with each being researched in turn up to the point of rejection.
This indicates one of the immutable reasons for the cordination and supervision of the research program being under a globally mandated scientific agency – while the potential of any unilateral or bilateral deployment to trigger warfare similarly indicates that to be sustainable any deployment will have to be by the collective decision of the member states of the UN. A further consideration is that any reduction of states’ ambition on Emissions Control should be precluded by the stipulation that no such decision to deploy is valid until a credibly stringent Emissions Control treaty has come into force.
Though this reliance on the UN as the authority over the RD&D of both modes of Geo-E may anathema to the right wing in America, it is actually strictly practical, as they would logically be still more opposed to China, Russia or say Iran developing Geo-E research without that constraint, co-ordination and supervision of their programs.
I should be interested to hear others’ views on the issue of appropriate governance as well as on just what co-benefits might be gained from this necessarily massive supra-national research effort.
Regards,
Lewis
Hank#203,
” 203.JJ — Shakhova recent trip was when?
It should appear in the list at http://www.iarc.uaf.edu/expeditions/
but I didn’t hear a year mentioned in any of the three videos Nick Breeze posted. It’s sometimes confusing whether she’s referring to the 2011 trip or something newer.”
In #198, I stated May 2014. As I remember from the video, she stated late April-early May 2014.
Hank#199,
“.JJ, you’re proclaiming that models don’t include carbon feedbacks (or not the right ones, or not enough of them, or something)
Which of these have you read enough about to criticize?
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=climate+model+carbon+feedbacks”
There are many researchers generating climate models at varying levels of detail and quality, and some include limited numbers of carbon cycle feedbacks. The models and results used for policy purposes, by governments, industry, and major mitigation proposers, tend to be those from the IPCC reports. The following link is typical of many that have analyzed the IPCC reports/models, and identified some of the shortcomings relating to carbon cycle feedback modeling.
http://www.gci.org.uk/CBAT1_i-9b.html
According to Cook et al, and other surveys of the literature, only a few dozen peer-reviewed papers in the past 20 years have rejected the premise of AGW.
Which leads me to wonder if anyone has done a study evaluating those papers. For example, can one characterize their level of competence and accuracy? How many were explicitly repudiated by subsequent papers? How many made predictions that can since be tested, and were they correct? Have the positions of the authors of those papers evolved over the past decade?
To oversimplify, I guess I’m asking to what extent those papers constitute a source of credible scientific argument, and to what extent are they problematic or even demonstrably incorrect.
Note: Despite whatever bias might be perceived in my question, I’m not pushing any agenda here — it’s a genuine question, which I can’t presume to answer for myself.
My thanks to anyone who can provide some pointers or insight…
“Good standard of living” isn’t typically meant as equal to a truly sustainable, low-consumption lifestyle. So if you have a proposed level of consumption you’d like to propose as sustainable and a “good standard”, please do.
BPL: A permanent, comfortable home. Adequate groceries. Either a good job or a reasonable income. Safety from oppression and violence.
K: {BPL: And is it possible for you to post without extreme scornful sarcasm}
He said scornfully and sarcastically.
Yeah, sorry, but there was no scorn nor sarcasm.
BPL: You need to go back and read your post again. I found it hostile and offensive. I’m not looking for an apology, but you really, really need to review how you’re coming across.
K: So if you have a proposed level of consumption you’d like to propose as sustainable and a “good standard”, please do.
BPL: A comfortable home, adequate groceries, a job or a sufficient income, and freedom from violence and oppression.
K: Yeah, sorry, but there was no scorn nor sarcasm.
BPL: I found your post extremely offensive and needlessly hostile. I’m not looking for an apology, but you need to review how you’re coming across. I don’t care what your intent was, you were out of line. I can’t read your mind, but I can certainly read what you write, and how you write it.
Killian (#188),
“OMG. The comment was related to climate change in the early 1900’s.”
It seems pretty clear that you are using words, but your thinking is so muddled by lack of understanding that your words convey very little meaning.
You want things to happen quickly, yet it all has to be permaculture, which is slow and painstaking. I think you had better just drop climate from you interests and see if you can work on social aspects of permaculture which may not require much quantitative thinking. Permaculture has been its own reward for quite a few people and you may find success in broadening that.
Alarming, in a way a little different than usual:
Harper government links climate activists to ‘violent extremism’
Hank#199,
” Still plenty there considering the feedbacks you seem to think are ignored.
If you use the RC search tool you’ll find discussion of several such models.”
You are regurgitating massive amounts of data, and confusing data with information. Show me one study (of the many that have been referenced in RC) that examines the consequences of mitigation or BAU and uses a model that includes all the major carbon cycle feedbacks. I’m thinking of studies like the Price-Waterhouse, the IEA, IPCC, etc. I can’t think of one that incorporates these major feedbacks.
Killian: “No, sustainable has to mean it can go on indefinitely excepting some external shock to the system, like an expanding sun.”
This is why no one listens to you. You insist on solving the problem all at once or not at all. Given those two options, guess which will wind up happening.
The perfect is the enemy of the good, and in order to have good options we would have had to get started on the solutions 30 years ago when it became clear to the reality based community that we had a problem. We’re out of good options. We’re looking for acceptable solutions, where acceptable means they don’t result in collapse of civilization, ecological catastrophe, economic meltdown or massive human dieback. Those are the realities, and they are getting worse because the American people and their representatives still do not have the courage to accept those realities. Maybe your efforts might be more fruitful if you preach to the recalcitrant rather than the choir. But not everyone has the courage to do that, either.
“The United States says it will expand air-quality monitoring at some overseas diplomatic missions, following several years of reporting pollution data in China.
The goal is to increase awareness of the health risks of outdoor air pollution, which easily spreads across borders, Secretary of State John Kerry said in announcing the program on Wednesday.” http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/20/world/asia/us-to-monitor-air-quality-in-india-and-other-countries.html
Rutgers vs. Maas on this year’s weather. “Rutgers University climate scientist Jennifer Francis and colleagues link that wavy jet stream to a warming Arctic, where climate changes near the top of the world are happening faster than in Earth’s middle latitudes.” Maas says no.
—–
> JJ
Notice the moving goalposts?
First you say there’s no such study. Then you say there are too many studies for you to read. Then you insist the only acceptable study would be one that includes your talking points.
Sorry, JJ. You’re using a rhetorical tactic: “If You Can’t Prove Me Wrong, then I Must be Right
(The Argumentum Ad Ignorantiam Fallacy)”
Nope. What I pointed to is not “regurgitated” –that sort of reference material is what your librarian will help you find if you’ll only ask for help. The effort of thinking about it, that’s something either you have to do, or you have to decide who you trust for it (and cite your source).
PS for JJ
— let me make my reply to you as clear as I can.
Yes, of course, there are “shortcomings relating to carbon cycle feedback modeling.” That’s how science works!
You began by asserting there’s no such work.
You’re backing slowly toward the obvious: we’re working with incomplete information.
Claiming that we don’t know everything so we can’t decide anything is just another serving of Curry. You know better.
Accept that we _can_ work with incomplete information; then you’ll be in the middle along with the rest of us kibitzers here in the peanut gallery, and we can continue learning about the climate science.
JM, Lindzen had a legitimate theory, c. 1982, that a “tropical cirrus cloud infrared iris” might counteract global warming. However, satellite observations shot it down. He published essentially the same paper in 1992, 2002, and 2010, with similar results. Like Halton Arp in astronomy, he has become a laughingstock because of his inability to let go of his pet theory.
Kevin (#212),
Perhaps that explains why the break in at University of Victoria remains unsolved. The RCMP always get their man, especially if they’ve had him all along…. http://blogs.nature.com/climatefeedback/2009/12/canadian_climate_scientist_tar.html
Another attempt to shorten the circling…
#191 BP Levenson: “[M]eans you can keep on doing it for a reasonable period of time.”
#202 Killian: [I]t can go on indefinitely excepting some external shock to the system [].”
This sounds pretty close to me, like on the main, you do agree (but like to disagree). ;)
Sustainable definition from Wiktionary: Able to be produced or sustained for an indefinite period without damaging the environment, or without depleting a resource; renewable. [link]
‘reasonable’ suggestion: long enough to adapt to changing conditions (boundaries, parameters, impacts) keeping the system in or bringing it back to equilibrium and not stressing its limits (especially not tens at the same time like today) until it faces conditions the system can`t avoid, handle or alter by itself (hard limits).
As in this physical world everything that comes into or stays in existence is the result of the exchange of energy on various levels, it shows that the term ‘sustainable’ is a relational, not an absolut one. The usefulness of it depends thereon where we set the limits to take into consideration. It`s more like ‘sustainable up to’… (event X).
Sustainable in our world:
– Universe is not – it`s cooling out by expansion.
– galaxies are not – they are running out of fusionable matter for new stars and pesky black holes sucking up all and collisions with other galaxies tear them apart;
– black holes are (probably) not – because they radiate some of the matter back into space as energy;
– sun is not – as fusion fuel runs out;
-> so earth is not, as it is affected by most of above.
-> so life on earth isn’t; – your body isn`t – life ??? – space colonies, anyone?
Conditions for life on earth have been sustainable since around 1,2 bn yrs, but for 99,99x % of species they haven`t.
My frigde is empty every few days and my stomach doesn`t care about the hole in my pocket. Damn! :)
For every system in existence there are always hard limits to take into consideration.
(That`s why ‘sustainable growth‘ is an oxymoron.)
#213–“I’m thinking of studies like the Price-Waterhouse, the IEA, IPCC, etc. I can’t think of one that incorporates these major feedbacks.”
– See more at: https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2015/02/unforced-variations-feb-2015/comment-page-5/#comment-625669
Not sure what you mean by ‘the IPCC,’ since the Assessment Reports are in effect gigantic syntheses, or reviews, of the recent published literature. As such, they don’t have just one methodology. But AR5 certainly cites many studies using ESMs–“Earth System Models”, which incorporate carbon cycle feedbacks.
Are you thinking that the sort of study you propose would be easy to implement? It seems to me that the work is still at a less-advanced stage than that. As AR5 WG1 says on page 514:
“Confidence in the magnitude, and sometimes even the sign, of many of these feedbacks between climate and carbon and other biogeochemical cycles is low.”
IOW, the brush is still being cleared from the field of inquiry.
“tidal flows in the Arctic are causing deep, warm water (originating from the Gulf Stream) to mix with cold, fresh water lying above, in turn contributing to melting the floating sea-ice.”
http://phys.org/news/2015-02-tides-deep-atlantic-arctic-ocean.html
Hitting the ice from all directions!
#Ray ladbury, #217; +1
#Hank Roberts, #220: YMMD! seriously. :)
#Jasper Jaynes, #225; DOOM, Di Doom, Di Doom, Di Doom …
Another Republican climate blog bites the dust !
Hey… This websites article about climate change started a really bad panic attack. It said it we failed and it’s to late for us. Is it just tabloid BS and could anyone direct me to sights to get accurate new?
(http://www.vox.com/2014/4/22/5551004/two-degrees)
R: Another Republican climate blog bites the dust !
BPL: [Nelson Muntz voice:] HA ha!
Hank#219-220,
” Notice the moving goalposts?”
The goalposts have not moved one inch! I stand by my statement: Show me one study (of the many that have been referenced in RC) that examines the consequences of mitigation or BAU and uses a model that includes all the major carbon cycle feedbacks. Your regur$gitation of research papers with carbon feedback in the title is a ‘cover’ for your inability to show even ONE study that would refute my statement. The fact that the serious studies being used by governments, industry, and researchers like Anderson et al (to predict the consequences of mitigation or lack thereof) are not incorporating these feedback outputs of hundreds of researchers should be sending you a loud and clear message.
These omitted major carbon feedbacks (some of which are described in the links I provided to you) are potentially very significant. As Shakhova stated in her interviews I referenced, there are sufficient carbon reserves and sufficient pathways through which they can be released to cause major damage for the one source she discussed. Add in the effects of the other sources, and their cro$ss-coup$ling, and it becomes obvious that the omissions could be extremely significant.
There is a belief, being propounded by the commenters on RC and other similar sites, that geo-engineering is the Russian Roul$ette approach to saving the biosphere, and that the mitigation being pro$pounded has much less uncertainty. In the prior Holocene range, this may be true. However, we have already committed to temperature increases on the order of 2 C, well outside the Holocene. The effects of the mitigation proposed, evaluated using present models without carbon feedbacks, have similar uncertainties to geo-engineering in these higher temperature ranges. In reality, mitigation is another form of geo-engineering, where we are conducting global experiments that will modify the climate without any hard understanding of the consequences. Label it what you will, ‘doom$er’ or otherwise, but the feedback-light models that have been used to estimate future consequences have not convinced me at all that we can avoid extinction based on what we have done to the climate already, much less what we are projecting to do to the climate.
Ct (228): Hey… This websites article about climate change started a really bad panic attack. It said it we failed and it’s to late for us. Is it just tabloid BS and could anyone direct me to sights to get accurate new?
(http://www.vox.com/2014/4/22/5551004/two-degrees)
BPL: The report is pretty much accurate. I myself just submitted an article (which has NOT passed peer review yet) to Am. J. Clim. Change predicting that global agriculture will collapse completely around the year 2028, with big error bars, depending on our rate of CO2 emissions. Remember you heard it here first.
#128,
That article was written before the US-China Accord on emissions control. Likely the conference in Paris this year will will yield commitments that need much less further tweaking to keep under 2 C than at present. And, there are many way to do even better than that.
I couldn’t see the figure in Stanford et al. (2014), from which the figure in that article is adapted, clearly enough to check for a mistake, but RCP 4.5 is roughly the 2 C path so the 2.4 C in the figure may be a transcription error or a mistake in the original. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Representative_Concentration_Pathways#Projections_based_on_the_RCPs It may be in the original since Stanford et al.’s first page did not seem to acknowledge that RCP 4.5 is the 2 C pathway.
The largest problem with the article seems to be reliance on Pielke and Victor at the end. You can read about problems with Victor’s take on things here: https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2014/10/limiting-global-warming-to-2-c-why-victor-and-kennel-are-wrong/
JJ (230): Show me one study (of the many that have been referenced in RC) that examines the consequences of mitigation or BAU and uses a model that includes all the major carbon cycle feedbacks.
BPL: This is a serious suggestion. If you feel there’s a deficiency of such studies, why not write one up yourself? I’ll help if you need it. Seriously, build a model, run it, see what you get. Submit it to a journal.
BPL (#231),
Do you have a preprint up at arxiv? I’d be interested in reading it.
JJ, the AMEG “methane emergency” hasn’t got support. That’s the feedback you insist belongs in your narrow definition of a satisfactory model, which you want someone to find for you. If you’d read the prior history here you’d know. Use the search box.
I think it would make sense to have an “Alberta Free” label for potato chips, beef, bread and the like so that people who want to boycott Albertan products can do so easily.
Here’s a nice précis of a recent piece in “Global Change Biology” looking at mitigation potential for Ag, Forest & Land Use (AFOLU.)
(You’re welcome, Killian.)
Mischievously, I want to especially credit those ‘ideologues’ and ‘fossil fuel enablers’ at Cleantechnica for pulling together the summary and the infographic.
http://cleantechnica.com/2015/02/20/farming-now-worse-climate-deforestation-land-use-change/
You can find a lot by looking.
Home of the NERC-funded Methane in the Arctic: Measurements and Modelling (MAMM) project
http://arp.arctic.ac.uk/news/2013/aug/11/blog-mamm-arctic-methane-whats-story/
Does anyone know where I can find line strengths (HITRAN style or otherwise) on-line? I’ve just spent an hour searching Google for the line strength of the CO2 667.38 cm-1 line without any success whatsoever. I was kind of surprised.
Jasper Jaynes,
OK, let me get this straight. You are taking the scientific community to task for not including all the possible feedbacks into models, despite the fact that most of the feedbacks you are asking for are highly uncertain and don’t seem to be necessary for getting climate models to agree pretty well with reality.
And then you are trumpeting geoengineering as a solution, despite the fact that the forcings and feedbacks on which all proposed geoengineering solutions rely are the most uncertain factors in models as they currently exist. Do you maybe see a problem with your reasoning here? Anyone? Beuller?
(232)
Ok that’s good to know, you the PA is calming down now.
Concerned Teen#228-231,
Agree with BPL; seems reasonable. Notice that the carbon feedbacks are not included in the models they use, so the validity of estimates at temperature is unknown. Other interpretations of the target: http://www.climatecodered.org/2014/08/dangerous-climate-change-myths-and.html
Killian wrote: “… sustainable has to mean it can go on indefinitely excepting some external shock to the system, like an expanding sun.”
Arguing about the true meaning of “sustainable” is completely irrelevant to anthropogenic global warming, which is an urgent, short-term, specific, technical problem, which must be solved within YEARS, not decades or generations or centuries — or there simply will not be any “indefinitely” for us to worry about.
Dear Concerned Teen:
Your worries reflect the worries of a lot of us. It’s a hard lesson to swallow, but despair and apathy feed the problem. I would suggest you find local people working on developing clean energy sources and ways to store and deliver that energy on the one hand, and to defeat the political effort to hide from reality. 350.org is one good place, but there are a host of local organizations. In Massachusetts, for example, there is MCAN. Many of these people, along with artists and many other concerned citizens, are working to solve problems.
One place is “start here” on this blog. This community was formed to provide the service mentioned in the masthead “Climate Science from Climate Scientists” and is a bit sophisticated to even fairly scientifically informed laypeople like myself. It does, however, give you direct access to some of the best experts on the planet.
A lot of information is available on any subject on Wikipedia, and they have so far been able to keep the deception industry from dominating their articles. You will find the arguments in their discussion sections.
You can check answers to common questions and find resources at
http://www.skepticalscience.com
(you will find this is insulted and attacked at every turn, but this is because they do a good job of collecting the information in one place with many links to original work)
And do go to NASA!
http://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/nasaandyou/home/climate_resources_en.html
The news is not good, but there are things you can do, rather than channeling your worries in isolation. Our government needs to become more accountable to reality rather than to money in politics.
Being in community and working towards solutions is the best cure for panic, and you might make some new friends as well.
In addition, there is a large industry bent on persuading you that science is a big conspiracy and continued use of more and more fossil is the only option. If there is one bit of advice we could offer, it is not so much where to go (though NASA and all other legitimate scientific sources offer a variety of materials that are interesting and shed light on the subject) as where not to go. Popular websites such as Wattsupwiththat, ClimateAudit, ClimateDepot and others work hard to attack scientists, while pretending to be skeptical. Skepticism is open-minded, so you can spot them because they lack any curiosity as to whether there is anything to be learned from the worldwide scientific community outside their carefully selected experts. Some of these outliers sound pretty good. The attacks are relentless and well organized; keep in mind that big fossil are the wealthiest industries on earth and have hired some massively clever people to create an infrastructure that mirrors the real thing (NIPCC, Heartland, Cato Institute, ALEC and on and on).
DeSmogblog also provides background on some of these “climate villains”.
I’m sorry about this extensive side trip into the negative side, but you will find many many people believe politics is more important than reality, and it is necessary to be warned to head for the mainstream sites first.
Watch this link for DSCOVR imagery:
http://dscovr.space/
(A volunteer group planning to archive the imagery and keep it available and assemble snapshots into video form)
When?
“… It takes 115 days to reach orbit in L-1 or Lagrange 1 point. NASA will likely hand over DSCOVR to NOAA in mid-summer timeframe.
… Improvements were made in all narrow-length wavelength bands to reduce stray light and to add new cloud height measurements. Ozone, aerosols, cloud amount, and vegetation were all in original design. Wavelength changes were made based on other earth-observing satellites over the last 15 years. Earth science data will be obtained about every 2 hours and downloaded to earth whenever the large Wallops Island antenna is in view.”
http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/qa-on-noaas-dscovr-mission/
I think this is a well-written article by Dr. Jennifer Francis on the connections between Arctic warming, the Jet Stream, and “weird weather” — including the record-breaking cold that is punishing the Eastern USA this week:
A melting Arctic and weird weather: the plot thickens
By Jennifer Francis, Rutgers University
February 20 2015
SkepticalScience
Ray#240,
“OK, let me get this straight. You are taking the scientific community to task for not including all the possible feedbacks into models, despite the fact that most of the feedbacks you are asking for are highly uncertain and don’t seem to be necessary for getting climate models to agree pretty well with reality.”
JJ: I don’t know that I’m “taking them to task”. I’m commenting that the models don’t contain key terms/phenomena that may kick in with a vengeance somewhere between 1-2 C. I raised the issue to get some input on why they don’t contain such terms. There are many potential reasons, including the one you raised.
In Unforced Variations, January 2015, #195, I quoted the following excerpt from an article that Hank had posted:
” “The physical knowledge that too-tall cliffs fail is very old and familiar to every miner or quarry-worker. The physical knowledge that ice is not the strongest rock on the planet is also rather old. And, the suggestion that cliff failure could affect West Antarctic stability dates back to 1962,” Alley wrote.”
And then I commented as follows:
“So, ‘cliff failure’ is many decades old, and hydrofracturing is not exactly a new topic. Yet, these physical processes, which could provide a much better picture of how precarious our climate situation really is, are only now being inserted into the ice models?”
So, is this happening in incorporation of the positive feedback mechanisms as well, or is the challenge limited to what you describe? Seems to me a topic for discussion on a climate science blog.
“And then you are trumpeting geoengineering as a solution, despite the fact that the forcings and feedbacks on which all proposed geoengineering solutions rely are the most uncertain factors in models as they currently exist. Do you maybe see a problem with your reasoning here? Anyone? Beuller?”
JJ: My ‘trumpeting’ of geo-engineering is pure delusion on your part. I categorized mitigation as part of geo-engineering to emphasize the common features of each. In both cases, we are conducting global experiments whose consequences we can’t predict, especially when the temperatures start to rise past prior Holocene experience. And, BAU falls into the category of global experiments whose consequences we can’t predict as well.
JJ: I’ll end with a discussion of the last clause of your first paragraph above.
“don’t seem to be necessary for getting climate models to agree pretty well with reality”
I am surprised at you, Ray, for such a poorly considered statement. Climate models may be agreeing well with reality, but that reality so far is within the confines of prior Holocene temperatures, where the physics is relatively well known. The feedbacks may become important when we start to leave prior Holocene, and the physics necessary to describe climate phenomena becomes more complex (and uncertain).
BPL (#239),
This might work: http://hitran.iao.ru/
So your (#229 and #242) sayin by 2030-2050 Climate Change or global warming will cause and end of the world event that will lead to ppl dying out?
Concered Teen
I get what you mean but I doubt the future will be that bleak. Most news articles make it sound like their is nothing being done but that is not the case at all. Things are being done. Deals being cut wind farms being built and even BP oil has given climate input that’s basically a carbon tax or the closest thing that the republicans will let pass.