Climate Change & Global Warming

[KOYAANISQATSI]

...a well known denier, distorter and liar when it comes to climate science. Basically, if you read what he says and then assume the opposite is true then you won't be far off the mark.

 

A classic insight into the ArabiaTerra scientific method there; when it comes to things he dont want to hear about.

[ArabiaTerra]

^^^Electro-magnetic induction equipment has been in use for many years and is used extensively.

For measuring the thickness of ice? A link to somewhere that explains the technology would be nice.

The Caitlin trio:-

They are using sophisticated scientific equipment to survey the ice in order to establish baseline data for later comparison to establish the effects of climate change on the ice.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/16/weather-arctic-climate-change

but as it broke down they resorted to the old tape measure.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2009/may/08/catlin-arctic-survey-poles

We had our last hot food several days before the re-supply plane came. Up until then, Pen and Martin were carrying on with the ice drilling, but one evening they came back in so weak and wobbly we knew that they just had no energy left and it would be dangerous to continue.

Now what are the chances of someone making an error with the figures when they are in such a weakened state. Pretty high I would say.

 

I went to the website of the National Snow and Ice Data Center I notice you didn't put these bits from the article in :

 

Arctic sea ice extent declined quite slowly in April; as a result, total ice extent is now close to the mean extent for the reference period (1979 to 2000).

 

The decline rate for the month of April was the third slowest on record.

 

http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/

So? It's been a colder than usual spring and anyway, I linked to the article so you could read it yourself. It doesn't change the fact that Booker lied.

 

The thing is, even when the average temperature is rising globally due to AGW, we are still going to get colder years and hotter years. It's called weather. When this cold snap we've had for the last couple of years has lasted for 30 years, then you can call it climate. The current warming trend has been going on since about 1910, with an upwards spike between 1935 and 1945 dropping back in the early 50's, then resuming it's upward trend. Just because we've had a few colder years recently doesn't mean the warming has stopped, it's just the natural variability of the atmosphere.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/bb/Instrumental_Temperature_Record.svg/600px-Instrumental_Temperature_Record.svg.png

Anyway, we already know why we've been having a couple of colder years. It's due to a very strong La Niña, the opposite of the El Nino event which caused the record high temperatures in 1998. Nevertheless, 2008 was still the ninth warmest year since instrumental records began in 1880.

[ArabiaTerra]

...a well known denier, distorter and liar when it comes to climate science. Basically, if you read what he says and then assume the opposite is true then you won't be far off the mark.

 

A classic insight into the ArabiaTerra scientific method there; when it comes to things he dont want to hear about.

The guy's a liar. I proved he's a liar, and he has a well established track record of lying. So what's your problem?

[KOYAANISQATSI]

I don't have a problem; how could I on such a lovely sunny day like this.

 

Apart from all the chemtrail planes that is.

[khitajrah]

Um.. sorry to, er, post in between you guys arguing with each other but I was wondering if you could help me with a question? (or several?)

 

They discovered a "hole/depression, whatever you want to call it" in the ozone layer over Antarctica in 1985 which led to the whole CFCs & global warming thing, right? When did they start keeping records of the ozone? How long has the "hole" been there? Does it naturally fluctuate?

 

I'm only asking in here because my fellow OU students all appear to have died in the forum we're supposed to be discussing such things in.

 

Keep in mind I've never studied climate change before and I know diddly squat about it - just the stuff that's jammed down our throats by the media. (And please use small words so I'll be sure to understand).

[khitajrah]

Apart from all the chemtrail planes that is.

 

Funnily enough I was thinking of you as I saw one on the way home this afternoon. I was thinking.. look Koy, they're coming for you, what with this fine weather and all.

[ArabiaTerra]

^^^^ The ozone hole and climate change are actually quite separate phenomenon. ^^^^

 

The ozone hole was caused by the use of certain chemicals known as CFC's (Chlorofluorocarbons) which were used in refrigerators, freezers and (I think) air conditioning units. They were also used as propellent in aerosol cans. These chemicals, when they escaped into the atmosphere, reacted with the ozone, destroying it.

 

Due to the circulation of the atmosphere around the earth, instead of just thinning the ozone layer, the damage tended to concentrate at the poles, leading to the ozone holes.

 

The thing about ozone (an isotope of oxygen) is that it blocks the harmful ultra-violet rays from the sun. Without ozone life on land would be impossible as we'd all die of skin cancer.

 

When CFC's were banned, the damage to the ozone layer stopped and it is now slowly recovering, though it will probably take several decades to fully recover.

 

Climate change on the other hand, is caused by excess greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere by the burning of fossil fuels. The most dangerous of these is CO2, not because it is the most powerful greenhouse gas (Methane is much more potent), but because once it is in the atmosphere, it stays there for up to a hundred years. All the CO2 which we have generated from burning fossil fuels since before the first world war is still up there warming the planet.

 

The pre-industrial level of CO2 was around 280 parts per million (ppm). The level today is about 380ppm. That's a 1/3 increase and it's rising by about 1.5ppm/year. That's why the climate is changing.

 

Sunlight passes through the atmosphere because the atmosphere is transparent to light, it heats the ground then at night the ground radiates this heat back into space, or at least it tries to. The problem is that CO2 absorbs heat. Basically we've changed the colour of the sky at infra-red wavelengths (What you see through one of those thermal imaging cameras), we've made the sky darker so it traps the heat, warming the planet.

 

Hope that helps.

[ArabiaTerra]

There's also this from an earlier post:

There is a natural greenhouse effect. It keeps the planet habitable. Without it this planet would be a ball of ice. The reason for this natural effect is because there is life on this planet. Volcanoes produce CO2. Life absorbs this CO2 and some of this absorbed CO2 is buried when the life that absorbed it dies and ends up somewhere (Peat bogs, lake bottoms, tundra, etc) where it doesn't rot and immediately release the CO2 back into the atmosphere. This CO2 ends up, over millions of years, being buried and turning into coal, oil and gas. This is called the Gaia effect, and it's what stops the CO2 growing to dangerous levels and causing the temperature to rise and make the planet uninhabitable.

 

Venus has no life and therefore no gaia effect and it's atmosphere is approximately 90% CO2. The surface temperature is hot enough to melt lead. This is way above the temperature you would expect simply because Venus is closer to the sun. It's what the Earth would be like without life.

 

You with me so far?

 

The reason that the CO2 level rise follows the temperature rise when the Earth is going between an ice age and an inter-glacial is because the rising temperature changes the climate and places where dead vegetation was frozen (like the tundra) melt and the vegetation rots and adds more CO2 to the atmosphere. This in turn makes the temperature increase which melts more ice which releases more CO2. It's a feedback loop. It continues until the atmosphere reaches equilibrium again and you're no longer in an ice age, but in an inter-glacial instead. This is the point we're in at the moment.

 

The trigger for this is changes in the Earth's orbit known as the Milankovitch cycle.

 

So, what has this got to do with Global Warming?

 

Remember the Gaia effect, locking away the excess CO2 from volcanoes as oil, coal and gas? We are now digging up that excess CO2, burning it, and chucking it back into the atmosphere. Over the last 250 years we have dug up 50% of that locked carbon and burned it which has changed the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere by more than 100ppm. That is more than the natural variation between an ice age and an inter-glacial. This extra CO2 is what is causing Anthropogenic (man made) Global Warming (AGW).

 

It is true that there is a natural greenhouse effect. It is true that water vapour is a bigger greenhouse gas than CO2. But these factors are part of the natural background greenhouse effect which makes life possible. AGW, on the other hand, is not part of the natural cycle. It is man made and this is what is causing the problem. Nature has spent the last several hundred million years locking this excess CO2 away in the ground. We have put 50% of it back into the biosphere in 250 years. Back into play, so to speak.

 

This extra CO2 is causing extra warming on top of the natural effect, which in turn, is changing the climate in ways which would never have happened had man not been around. This extra warming is melting the Arctic ice (which reflects 90% of the suns energy back into space) leading to open water in the Arctic (which absorbs 90% of the suns energy) which leads to further warming (a feedback loop). This extra Arctic warming is melting the Siberian and Canadian tundra, which is then rotting and releasing more CO2 which, in turn leads to further warming (another feedback loop).

 

If we don't stop burning fossil fuels this will continue. It is already melting the Greenland ice sheet, and there are disturbing reports coming from scientists that it is beginning to affect the Antarctic ice sheet as well. AGW is beginning to cause runaway global warming which will lead to a very different world to that which we see today. It won't be a world which can support 7 billion people like we have at the moment, let alone the forecast 9 billion we will have by 2050.

 

So there you have it. Global Warming 101.

 

I hope this has enlightened you.

[ArabiaTerra]

An international team of scientists has used the latest electro-magnetic induction equipment to discover that the Arctic ice is in fact "twice as thick" as they had expected, says Christopher Booker....

1 Ice cap , 2 groups of scientists and two wildly differing measurements. Could we be going to see claims that we are entering another ice age plastered over the papers in the near future?

Just to expand on this, I checked the latest press release from the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research here. This is what they say about ice thickness:

All in all, the ice was somewhat thicker than during the last years in the same regions, which leads to the conclusion that Arctic ice cover recovers temporarily.

Nothing at all about the ice being "twice as thick as expected". Just the statement that the ice is a little thicker than it has been over the last two years. Looks like Booker was lying again.

[khitajrah]

Many thanks AT, that was a quick concise refresher for me I do recall a previous course teaching a bit about the greenhouse effect and planetary albedo and such things.

 

However, um... I don't know where to look to find the answers to my original questions: "When did they start keeping records of the ozone? How long has the "hole" been there? Does it naturally fluctuate?"

[paulb]

AT your statement on the CO2 cycle is wrong all the gases produced since before the first world war are not up there. Most are absorbed.

http://www.fas.org/irp/imint/docs/rst/Sect16/carbon_cycle_diagram.jpg

 

Its methane that will become an issue in the future. CO2 will be controlled there may be years of adverse weather but it will return to normal. the issue is if it get to the point that it releases the methane then it would be harder to reverse.

 

It easier to simplify statements but you will lose your argument over global warming if you make statements like that.

[khitajrah]

AT your statement on the CO2 cycle is wrong all the gases produced since before the first world war are not up there. Most are absorbed.

 

Surely it takes a considerable length of time for CO2 to be reabsorbed. An insignificant period of time, on a geological scale, has elapsed since WW1 so why wouldn't those gases still be there? It's being pumped in to the atmosphere faster than nature can deal with it, no?

[paulb]

Many thanks AT, that was a quick concise refresher for me I do recall a previous course teaching a bit about the greenhouse effect and planetary albedo and such things.

 

However, um... I don't know where to look to find the answers to my original questions: "When did they start keeping records of the ozone? How long has the "hole" been there? Does it naturally fluctuate?"

As its natural its bound to change. The cfc would have made the hole/thinner ozone layer worse but it would have been there. See if the Aussies have any figures they were the worst affected. I can only guess that they would have been sampling from about the mid 60s.

Try this site seems to answear your questions. I did this on a OU science course a few years ago so i will be getting things wrong.

http://www.atm.ch.cam.ac.uk/tour/

[paulb]

AT your statement on the CO2 cycle is wrong all the gases produced since before the first world war are not up there. Most are absorbed.

 

Surely it takes a considerable length of time for CO2 to be reabsorbed. An insignificant period of time, on a geological scale, has elapsed since WW1 so why wouldn't those gases still be there? It's being pumped in to the atmosphere faster than nature can deal with it, no?

most gas produced is absorbed in that year. the excess is what is raising the co2 level. Its a problem that needs fixing. But it is not one that cant be fixed if the Co2 was to remain in the atmosphere then we would end up like Venus. this does not happen because of the various transportation methods the earth has for capturing the gas. Hence lots of the rocks have a high level of co2. Volcanoes release large amounts of gas because of the subduction of rich oceanic rocks/seafloor.

[paulb]

http://www.grida.no/publications/vg/climate/page/3066.aspx

we forget that our little planet has dealt with worse things than what man can throw at her. the issue is are we going to be here after she has dealt with us.