Too late to avert Global warming
Jan 21st 2007 | 2:59 am
#1
Guest
Posts: n/a
Too late to avert Global warming
It's too late to avert global warming
January 21, 2007
By TOM WATKINS
It's too late. Certainly it is time to start to fix the damage but it
is too late to avert the coming climatic changes. India and China are
just beginning their industrial revolution and are increasing their
demand for power and transportation. And their populations are eight
times that of the United States (over 2.4 billion people). Even if they
were to cut their emissions to only 25 percent of what we produce now
(very unlikely), that would still be more than twice the pollution the
United States created. This doesn't even consider the billion and a
half other people in Africa, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh and many
parts of Mexico, South and Central America (and growing by 80 million
per year) that have yet to hit their peak of industrial pollution.
As the predominant contributor of the greenhouse gases and the richest
economy in the world, you would think that our political leaders would
want to lead the world by setting examples and investing in the
technologies needed. That won't happen as long as our government is
dominated by politicians who owe their allegiance to their largest
campaign contributors.
We are now considering 7 percent to 9 percent emissions reductions over
the next 10 years, but other occurring and developing events will
drastically overwhelm that small effort. Here are a few events with
tremendous momentum that won't stop without emission reductions of 80
percent or 95 percent:
# 14 percent of the permanent sea ice melted in only two years
(Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 33, L17501);
# 16,200 square kilometers of ice shelves (Larsen, Wilkins and Larsen
B) have broken off and are melting - more than any other time in
recorded history;
# The Alaskan and Siberian tundras are melting. This has begun a
process of runaway feedback heating effect caused by the heat absorbed
by the darker exposed ground (Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences, vol. 103, p. 14288);
# When the tundra heats up just one more degree centigrade, it will
release as much as 70,000 million of tons of methane from the thawing
peat - the most powerful greenhouse gas. (Nature, vol. 443, p. 71).
# The northern latitudes of Canada, Alaska and Siberia are experiencing
insect infestations (bark beetles, moths, etc.) that are wiping out
thousands of acres of trees and creating forest fires on a scale not
seen in modern times.
# Jet contrails, Pinatubo, El Chichon, Mount St. Helens and other
contributors to high-level atmospheric light scattering have masked the
actual warming of the troposphere for over 20 years. (LLNL Program for
Climate Model Diagnosis, 1-1/2-8/2001)
# Each year, deforestation contributes 23 to 30 percent of all carbon
dioxide in the atmosphere and we are losing the rainforests at a rate
of one and a half acres per second - 1 percent per year. Twenty
percent of the world's oxygen is produced by the conversion of carbon
dioxide. An increasing cycle of unsustainable regeneration has begun
that will push the rain forests to the point of no return in 10 to 15
years. (James Alcock, Geology Society of London in Edinburgh, June
2001)
# Most continuous or repeated global warming studies that date back
more than a decade have resulted in corrections to the rate of warming,
melting and other effects. Sea ice, glacier loss, sea-level rise, fresh
water loss, insect populations, bird migrations and carbon loss rates
have all been accelerated to a faster rate since their first studies.
These and many more effects of global warming have physical and
causation momentum that cannot be stopped or even slowed in the short
term (less than 10 years). Given the inevitable future actions of the
billions of people in the developing world, the total lack of will on
the part of our political leaders and the disregard for our future from
powerful commercial interests, it's already too late.
Although we should strive to begin to move out of the discovery mode
and into the correction phase, realistically, that will take decades.
By then the effects will be upon us. If we do not begin to identify
mitigating responses before they begin, we will suffer massively while
we adjust to the changes after they create serious problems.
Tom Watkins, a decision supports analyst, lives in Montpelier.
January 21, 2007
By TOM WATKINS
It's too late. Certainly it is time to start to fix the damage but it
is too late to avert the coming climatic changes. India and China are
just beginning their industrial revolution and are increasing their
demand for power and transportation. And their populations are eight
times that of the United States (over 2.4 billion people). Even if they
were to cut their emissions to only 25 percent of what we produce now
(very unlikely), that would still be more than twice the pollution the
United States created. This doesn't even consider the billion and a
half other people in Africa, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh and many
parts of Mexico, South and Central America (and growing by 80 million
per year) that have yet to hit their peak of industrial pollution.
As the predominant contributor of the greenhouse gases and the richest
economy in the world, you would think that our political leaders would
want to lead the world by setting examples and investing in the
technologies needed. That won't happen as long as our government is
dominated by politicians who owe their allegiance to their largest
campaign contributors.
We are now considering 7 percent to 9 percent emissions reductions over
the next 10 years, but other occurring and developing events will
drastically overwhelm that small effort. Here are a few events with
tremendous momentum that won't stop without emission reductions of 80
percent or 95 percent:
# 14 percent of the permanent sea ice melted in only two years
(Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 33, L17501);
# 16,200 square kilometers of ice shelves (Larsen, Wilkins and Larsen
B) have broken off and are melting - more than any other time in
recorded history;
# The Alaskan and Siberian tundras are melting. This has begun a
process of runaway feedback heating effect caused by the heat absorbed
by the darker exposed ground (Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences, vol. 103, p. 14288);
# When the tundra heats up just one more degree centigrade, it will
release as much as 70,000 million of tons of methane from the thawing
peat - the most powerful greenhouse gas. (Nature, vol. 443, p. 71).
# The northern latitudes of Canada, Alaska and Siberia are experiencing
insect infestations (bark beetles, moths, etc.) that are wiping out
thousands of acres of trees and creating forest fires on a scale not
seen in modern times.
# Jet contrails, Pinatubo, El Chichon, Mount St. Helens and other
contributors to high-level atmospheric light scattering have masked the
actual warming of the troposphere for over 20 years. (LLNL Program for
Climate Model Diagnosis, 1-1/2-8/2001)
# Each year, deforestation contributes 23 to 30 percent of all carbon
dioxide in the atmosphere and we are losing the rainforests at a rate
of one and a half acres per second - 1 percent per year. Twenty
percent of the world's oxygen is produced by the conversion of carbon
dioxide. An increasing cycle of unsustainable regeneration has begun
that will push the rain forests to the point of no return in 10 to 15
years. (James Alcock, Geology Society of London in Edinburgh, June
2001)
# Most continuous or repeated global warming studies that date back
more than a decade have resulted in corrections to the rate of warming,
melting and other effects. Sea ice, glacier loss, sea-level rise, fresh
water loss, insect populations, bird migrations and carbon loss rates
have all been accelerated to a faster rate since their first studies.
These and many more effects of global warming have physical and
causation momentum that cannot be stopped or even slowed in the short
term (less than 10 years). Given the inevitable future actions of the
billions of people in the developing world, the total lack of will on
the part of our political leaders and the disregard for our future from
powerful commercial interests, it's already too late.
Although we should strive to begin to move out of the discovery mode
and into the correction phase, realistically, that will take decades.
By then the effects will be upon us. If we do not begin to identify
mitigating responses before they begin, we will suffer massively while
we adjust to the changes after they create serious problems.
Tom Watkins, a decision supports analyst, lives in Montpelier.
Jan 21st 2007 | 3:06 am
#2
Guest
Posts: n/a
Re: Too late to avert Global warming
> It's too late. Certainly it is time to start to fix the damage but it
> is too late to avert the coming climatic changes.
Wladiwostok
> is too late to avert the coming climatic changes.
Wladiwostok
Jan 21st 2007 | 3:09 am
#3
Guest
Posts: n/a
Re: Too late to avert Global warming
"Erick T. Barkhuis" <[email protected]> kirjoitti
viestissä:[email protected] al.net...
>
>> It's too late. Certainly it is time to start to fix the damage but it
>> is too late to avert the coming climatic changes.
>
> Wladiwostok
>
Are you trying to say something?
viestissä:[email protected] al.net...
>
>> It's too late. Certainly it is time to start to fix the damage but it
>> is too late to avert the coming climatic changes.
>
> Wladiwostok
>
Are you trying to say something?
Jan 21st 2007 | 3:15 am
#4
Guest
Posts: n/a
Re: Too late to avert Global warming
Global warming is destined to have a far more destructive and earlier
impact than previously estimated, the most authoritative report yet
produced on climate change will warn next week.
A draft copy of the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change, obtained by The Observer, shows the frequency
of devastating storms - like the ones that battered Britain last week -
will increase dramatically. Sea levels will rise over the century by
around half a meter; snow will disappear from all but the highest
mountains; deserts will spread; oceans become acidic, leading to the
destruction of coral reefs and atolls; and deadly heatwaves will become
more prevalent.
The impact will be catastrophic, forcing hundreds of millions of people
to flee their devastated homelands, particularly in tropical, low-lying
areas, while creating waves of immigrants whose movements will strain
the economies of even the most affluent countries.
"The really chilling thing about the IPCC report is that it is the work
of several thousand climate experts who have widely differing views
about how greenhouse gases will have their effect. Some think they will
have a major impact, others a lesser role. Each paragraph of this
report was therefore argued over and scrutinized intensely. Only points
that were considered indisputable survived this process. This is a very
conservative document - that's what makes it so scary," said one senior
U.K. climate expert.
Climate concerns are likely to dominate international politics next
month. President Bush is to make the issue a part of his state of the
union address on Wednesday while the IPCC report's final version is set
for release on February 2 in a set of global news conferences.
Although the final wording of the report is still being worked on, the
draft indicates that scientists now have their clearest idea so far
about future climate changes, as well as about recent events. It points
out that:
-- 12 of the past 13 years were the warmest since records began;
-- ocean temperatures have risen at least three kilometres beneath the
surface;
-- glaciers, snow cover and permafrost have decreased in both
hemispheres;
-- sea levels are rising at the rate of almost 2 millimeters a year;
-- cold days, nights and frost have become rarer while hot days, hot
nights and heatwaves have become more frequent.
And the cause is clear, say the authors: "It is very likely that
[man-made] greenhouse gas increases caused most of the average
temperature increases since the mid-20th century," says the report.
To date, these changes have caused global temperatures to rise by 0.6
Celsius. The most likely outcome of continuing rises in greenhouses
gases will be to make the planet a further 3C hotter by 2100, although
the report acknowledges that rises of 4.5C to 5C could be experienced.
Ice-cap melting, rises in sea levels, flooding, cyclones and storms
will be an inevitable consequence.
Past assessments by the IPCC have suggested such scenarios are "likely"
to occur this century. Its latest report, based on sophisticated
computer models and more detailed observations of snow cover loss, sea
level rises and the spread of deserts, is far more robust and
confident. Now the panel writes of changes as "extremely likely" and
"almost certain".
And in a specific rebuff to sceptics who still argue natural variation
in the Sun's output is the real cause of climate change, the panel says
mankind's industrial emissions have had five times more effect on the
climate than any fluctuations in solar radiation. We are the masters of
our own destruction, in short.
There is some comfort, however. The panel believes the Gulf Stream will
go on bathing Britain with its warm waters for the next 100 years. Some
researchers have said it could be disrupted by cold waters pouring off
Greenland's melting ice sheets, plunging western Europe into a mini Ice
Age, as depicted in the disaster film "The Day After Tomorrow".
The report reflects climate scientists' growing fears that Earth is
nearing the stage when carbon dioxide rises will bring irreversible
change to the planet. "We are seeing vast sections of Antarctic ice
disappearing at an alarming rate," said climate expert Chris Rapley, in
a phone call to The Observer from the Antarctic Peninsula last week.
"That means we can expect to see sea levels rise at about a meter a
century from now on - and that will have devastating consequences."
However, there is still hope, said Peter Cox of Exeter University. "We
are like alcoholics who have got as far as admitting there is a
problem. It is a start. Now we have got to start drying out - which
means reducing our carbon output."
Intellpuke: Since it was not mentioned it in this article, I am left to
assume that a draft report by NOAA scientists reported on this past
week isn't yet included in the IPCC's draft report. The U.S. National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's report - drafted by a number
of scientists in a variety of climate-related fields - found that CO2
levels in the atmosphere in 2006 were much higher than they anticipated
and believe that global warming may be affecting the ability of the
soil and water on our planet to absorb CO2, thus accounting for the
surprising increase of it in Earth's atmosphere.
In just the past few months, climatogoligists, hydrologists and
glaciologists from Europe to Greenland to the North American arctic and
to Siberia have been surprised by how fast ice is melting around the
planet, saying it is melting much faster than even they anticipated.
Siberian and North American scientists are also extremely concerned
about the rapidity of thawing in huge regions of permafrost around the
planet. As those regions thaw, methane gas is being released and the
permafrost areas contain millions if not billions of tons of methane
than may soon be relased into the atmosphere by the thawing. Methane is
even worse in terms of global warming than CO2.
The meltoff of fresh water from all this thawing ice is going into the
oceans and seas of the planet, is afftecting Earth's largest ecosystems
(or food chains), and there are already studies showing changes in the
Gulf Stream the British are counting on to keep their climate
temperate.
Thus, it is beginning to look, at least to me, as if these, and other,
facets of global warming are not only becoming cumulative, but are also
beginning to move at exponential rates. So, when I hear scientists
talking about climate effects a century or centuries from now, I am
skeptical because I think many of the worst aspects of global warming
will impact us - all of us on the planet - in well less than a century.
Nothing would please me more than to be wrong about this and look the
fool but, if I'm right, scientists working on global warming are in for
a few more very big and very discouraging surprises.
So, You can read this article by The Observer's science editor Robin
McKie, reporting from London, England, in context here:
observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1995348,00.html
impact than previously estimated, the most authoritative report yet
produced on climate change will warn next week.
A draft copy of the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change, obtained by The Observer, shows the frequency
of devastating storms - like the ones that battered Britain last week -
will increase dramatically. Sea levels will rise over the century by
around half a meter; snow will disappear from all but the highest
mountains; deserts will spread; oceans become acidic, leading to the
destruction of coral reefs and atolls; and deadly heatwaves will become
more prevalent.
The impact will be catastrophic, forcing hundreds of millions of people
to flee their devastated homelands, particularly in tropical, low-lying
areas, while creating waves of immigrants whose movements will strain
the economies of even the most affluent countries.
"The really chilling thing about the IPCC report is that it is the work
of several thousand climate experts who have widely differing views
about how greenhouse gases will have their effect. Some think they will
have a major impact, others a lesser role. Each paragraph of this
report was therefore argued over and scrutinized intensely. Only points
that were considered indisputable survived this process. This is a very
conservative document - that's what makes it so scary," said one senior
U.K. climate expert.
Climate concerns are likely to dominate international politics next
month. President Bush is to make the issue a part of his state of the
union address on Wednesday while the IPCC report's final version is set
for release on February 2 in a set of global news conferences.
Although the final wording of the report is still being worked on, the
draft indicates that scientists now have their clearest idea so far
about future climate changes, as well as about recent events. It points
out that:
-- 12 of the past 13 years were the warmest since records began;
-- ocean temperatures have risen at least three kilometres beneath the
surface;
-- glaciers, snow cover and permafrost have decreased in both
hemispheres;
-- sea levels are rising at the rate of almost 2 millimeters a year;
-- cold days, nights and frost have become rarer while hot days, hot
nights and heatwaves have become more frequent.
And the cause is clear, say the authors: "It is very likely that
[man-made] greenhouse gas increases caused most of the average
temperature increases since the mid-20th century," says the report.
To date, these changes have caused global temperatures to rise by 0.6
Celsius. The most likely outcome of continuing rises in greenhouses
gases will be to make the planet a further 3C hotter by 2100, although
the report acknowledges that rises of 4.5C to 5C could be experienced.
Ice-cap melting, rises in sea levels, flooding, cyclones and storms
will be an inevitable consequence.
Past assessments by the IPCC have suggested such scenarios are "likely"
to occur this century. Its latest report, based on sophisticated
computer models and more detailed observations of snow cover loss, sea
level rises and the spread of deserts, is far more robust and
confident. Now the panel writes of changes as "extremely likely" and
"almost certain".
And in a specific rebuff to sceptics who still argue natural variation
in the Sun's output is the real cause of climate change, the panel says
mankind's industrial emissions have had five times more effect on the
climate than any fluctuations in solar radiation. We are the masters of
our own destruction, in short.
There is some comfort, however. The panel believes the Gulf Stream will
go on bathing Britain with its warm waters for the next 100 years. Some
researchers have said it could be disrupted by cold waters pouring off
Greenland's melting ice sheets, plunging western Europe into a mini Ice
Age, as depicted in the disaster film "The Day After Tomorrow".
The report reflects climate scientists' growing fears that Earth is
nearing the stage when carbon dioxide rises will bring irreversible
change to the planet. "We are seeing vast sections of Antarctic ice
disappearing at an alarming rate," said climate expert Chris Rapley, in
a phone call to The Observer from the Antarctic Peninsula last week.
"That means we can expect to see sea levels rise at about a meter a
century from now on - and that will have devastating consequences."
However, there is still hope, said Peter Cox of Exeter University. "We
are like alcoholics who have got as far as admitting there is a
problem. It is a start. Now we have got to start drying out - which
means reducing our carbon output."
Intellpuke: Since it was not mentioned it in this article, I am left to
assume that a draft report by NOAA scientists reported on this past
week isn't yet included in the IPCC's draft report. The U.S. National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's report - drafted by a number
of scientists in a variety of climate-related fields - found that CO2
levels in the atmosphere in 2006 were much higher than they anticipated
and believe that global warming may be affecting the ability of the
soil and water on our planet to absorb CO2, thus accounting for the
surprising increase of it in Earth's atmosphere.
In just the past few months, climatogoligists, hydrologists and
glaciologists from Europe to Greenland to the North American arctic and
to Siberia have been surprised by how fast ice is melting around the
planet, saying it is melting much faster than even they anticipated.
Siberian and North American scientists are also extremely concerned
about the rapidity of thawing in huge regions of permafrost around the
planet. As those regions thaw, methane gas is being released and the
permafrost areas contain millions if not billions of tons of methane
than may soon be relased into the atmosphere by the thawing. Methane is
even worse in terms of global warming than CO2.
The meltoff of fresh water from all this thawing ice is going into the
oceans and seas of the planet, is afftecting Earth's largest ecosystems
(or food chains), and there are already studies showing changes in the
Gulf Stream the British are counting on to keep their climate
temperate.
Thus, it is beginning to look, at least to me, as if these, and other,
facets of global warming are not only becoming cumulative, but are also
beginning to move at exponential rates. So, when I hear scientists
talking about climate effects a century or centuries from now, I am
skeptical because I think many of the worst aspects of global warming
will impact us - all of us on the planet - in well less than a century.
Nothing would please me more than to be wrong about this and look the
fool but, if I'm right, scientists working on global warming are in for
a few more very big and very discouraging surprises.
So, You can read this article by The Observer's science editor Robin
McKie, reporting from London, England, in context here:
observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1995348,00.html
Jan 21st 2007 | 3:19 am
#5
Guest
Posts: n/a
Re: Too late to avert Global warming
On Sun, 21 Jan 2007 17:06:02 +0100, Erick T. Barkhuis
<[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> It's too late. Certainly it is time to start to fix the damage but it
>> is too late to avert the coming climatic changes.
>
>Wladiwostok
A Plonker [OED]
2. slang (chiefly Brit. and Austral.).
a. The penis. Also in extended use.
to pull a person's plonker: to deceive a person humorously or playfully; cf.
to pull a person's leg at PULL v. Phrases 13a
--
Martin
<[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> It's too late. Certainly it is time to start to fix the damage but it
>> is too late to avert the coming climatic changes.
>
>Wladiwostok
A Plonker [OED]
2. slang (chiefly Brit. and Austral.).
a. The penis. Also in extended use.
to pull a person's plonker: to deceive a person humorously or playfully; cf.
to pull a person's leg at PULL v. Phrases 13a
--
Martin
Jan 21st 2007 | 3:22 am
#6
Guest
Posts: n/a
Re: OT blahblah
You HAVE noticed this group is open to any topic except it's title, haven't
you ?
<[email protected]> a écrit dans le message de news:
[email protected] om...
> It's too late to avert global warming
>
> January 21, 2007
>
> By TOM WATKINS
>
> It's too late. Certainly it is time to start to fix the damage but it
> is too late to avert the coming climatic changes. India and China are
> just beginning their industrial revolution and are increasing their
> demand for power and transportation. And their populations are eight
> times that of the United States (over 2.4 billion people). Even if they
> were to cut their emissions to only 25 percent of what we produce now
> (very unlikely), that would still be more than twice the pollution the
> United States created. This doesn't even consider the billion and a
> half other people in Africa, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh and many
> parts of Mexico, South and Central America (and growing by 80 million
> per year) that have yet to hit their peak of industrial pollution.
>
> As the predominant contributor of the greenhouse gases and the richest
> economy in the world, you would think that our political leaders would
> want to lead the world by setting examples and investing in the
> technologies needed. That won't happen as long as our government is
> dominated by politicians who owe their allegiance to their largest
> campaign contributors.
>
> We are now considering 7 percent to 9 percent emissions reductions over
> the next 10 years, but other occurring and developing events will
> drastically overwhelm that small effort. Here are a few events with
> tremendous momentum that won't stop without emission reductions of 80
> percent or 95 percent:
>
> # 14 percent of the permanent sea ice melted in only two years
> (Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 33, L17501);
>
> # 16,200 square kilometers of ice shelves (Larsen, Wilkins and Larsen
> B) have broken off and are melting - more than any other time in
> recorded history;
>
> # The Alaskan and Siberian tundras are melting. This has begun a
> process of runaway feedback heating effect caused by the heat absorbed
> by the darker exposed ground (Proceedings of the National Academy of
> Sciences, vol. 103, p. 14288);
>
> # When the tundra heats up just one more degree centigrade, it will
> release as much as 70,000 million of tons of methane from the thawing
> peat - the most powerful greenhouse gas. (Nature, vol. 443, p. 71).
>
> # The northern latitudes of Canada, Alaska and Siberia are experiencing
> insect infestations (bark beetles, moths, etc.) that are wiping out
> thousands of acres of trees and creating forest fires on a scale not
> seen in modern times.
>
> # Jet contrails, Pinatubo, El Chichon, Mount St. Helens and other
> contributors to high-level atmospheric light scattering have masked the
> actual warming of the troposphere for over 20 years. (LLNL Program for
> Climate Model Diagnosis, 1-1/2-8/2001)
>
> # Each year, deforestation contributes 23 to 30 percent of all carbon
> dioxide in the atmosphere and we are losing the rainforests at a rate
> of one and a half acres per second - 1 percent per year. Twenty
> percent of the world's oxygen is produced by the conversion of carbon
> dioxide. An increasing cycle of unsustainable regeneration has begun
> that will push the rain forests to the point of no return in 10 to 15
> years. (James Alcock, Geology Society of London in Edinburgh, June
> 2001)
>
> # Most continuous or repeated global warming studies that date back
> more than a decade have resulted in corrections to the rate of warming,
> melting and other effects. Sea ice, glacier loss, sea-level rise, fresh
> water loss, insect populations, bird migrations and carbon loss rates
> have all been accelerated to a faster rate since their first studies.
>
>
>
> These and many more effects of global warming have physical and
> causation momentum that cannot be stopped or even slowed in the short
> term (less than 10 years). Given the inevitable future actions of the
> billions of people in the developing world, the total lack of will on
> the part of our political leaders and the disregard for our future from
> powerful commercial interests, it's already too late.
>
> Although we should strive to begin to move out of the discovery mode
> and into the correction phase, realistically, that will take decades.
> By then the effects will be upon us. If we do not begin to identify
> mitigating responses before they begin, we will suffer massively while
> we adjust to the changes after they create serious problems.
>
> Tom Watkins, a decision supports analyst, lives in Montpelier.
>
you ?
<[email protected]> a écrit dans le message de news:
[email protected] om...
> It's too late to avert global warming
>
> January 21, 2007
>
> By TOM WATKINS
>
> It's too late. Certainly it is time to start to fix the damage but it
> is too late to avert the coming climatic changes. India and China are
> just beginning their industrial revolution and are increasing their
> demand for power and transportation. And their populations are eight
> times that of the United States (over 2.4 billion people). Even if they
> were to cut their emissions to only 25 percent of what we produce now
> (very unlikely), that would still be more than twice the pollution the
> United States created. This doesn't even consider the billion and a
> half other people in Africa, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh and many
> parts of Mexico, South and Central America (and growing by 80 million
> per year) that have yet to hit their peak of industrial pollution.
>
> As the predominant contributor of the greenhouse gases and the richest
> economy in the world, you would think that our political leaders would
> want to lead the world by setting examples and investing in the
> technologies needed. That won't happen as long as our government is
> dominated by politicians who owe their allegiance to their largest
> campaign contributors.
>
> We are now considering 7 percent to 9 percent emissions reductions over
> the next 10 years, but other occurring and developing events will
> drastically overwhelm that small effort. Here are a few events with
> tremendous momentum that won't stop without emission reductions of 80
> percent or 95 percent:
>
> # 14 percent of the permanent sea ice melted in only two years
> (Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 33, L17501);
>
> # 16,200 square kilometers of ice shelves (Larsen, Wilkins and Larsen
> B) have broken off and are melting - more than any other time in
> recorded history;
>
> # The Alaskan and Siberian tundras are melting. This has begun a
> process of runaway feedback heating effect caused by the heat absorbed
> by the darker exposed ground (Proceedings of the National Academy of
> Sciences, vol. 103, p. 14288);
>
> # When the tundra heats up just one more degree centigrade, it will
> release as much as 70,000 million of tons of methane from the thawing
> peat - the most powerful greenhouse gas. (Nature, vol. 443, p. 71).
>
> # The northern latitudes of Canada, Alaska and Siberia are experiencing
> insect infestations (bark beetles, moths, etc.) that are wiping out
> thousands of acres of trees and creating forest fires on a scale not
> seen in modern times.
>
> # Jet contrails, Pinatubo, El Chichon, Mount St. Helens and other
> contributors to high-level atmospheric light scattering have masked the
> actual warming of the troposphere for over 20 years. (LLNL Program for
> Climate Model Diagnosis, 1-1/2-8/2001)
>
> # Each year, deforestation contributes 23 to 30 percent of all carbon
> dioxide in the atmosphere and we are losing the rainforests at a rate
> of one and a half acres per second - 1 percent per year. Twenty
> percent of the world's oxygen is produced by the conversion of carbon
> dioxide. An increasing cycle of unsustainable regeneration has begun
> that will push the rain forests to the point of no return in 10 to 15
> years. (James Alcock, Geology Society of London in Edinburgh, June
> 2001)
>
> # Most continuous or repeated global warming studies that date back
> more than a decade have resulted in corrections to the rate of warming,
> melting and other effects. Sea ice, glacier loss, sea-level rise, fresh
> water loss, insect populations, bird migrations and carbon loss rates
> have all been accelerated to a faster rate since their first studies.
>
>
>
> These and many more effects of global warming have physical and
> causation momentum that cannot be stopped or even slowed in the short
> term (less than 10 years). Given the inevitable future actions of the
> billions of people in the developing world, the total lack of will on
> the part of our political leaders and the disregard for our future from
> powerful commercial interests, it's already too late.
>
> Although we should strive to begin to move out of the discovery mode
> and into the correction phase, realistically, that will take decades.
> By then the effects will be upon us. If we do not begin to identify
> mitigating responses before they begin, we will suffer massively while
> we adjust to the changes after they create serious problems.
>
> Tom Watkins, a decision supports analyst, lives in Montpelier.
>
Jan 21st 2007 | 7:51 am
#7
Guest
Posts: n/a
Re: Too late to avert Global warming
Would martin be good enough to join others in his own so called plonking ?
"Martin" <[email protected]> a écrit dans le message de news:
[email protected]...
> On Sun, 21 Jan 2007 17:06:02 +0100, Erick T. Barkhuis
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>
>>> It's too late. Certainly it is time to start to fix the damage but it
>>> is too late to avert the coming climatic changes.
>>
>>Wladiwostok
>
> A Plonker [OED]
>
> 2. slang (chiefly Brit. and Austral.).
>
> a. The penis. Also in extended use.
> to pull a person's plonker: to deceive a person humorously or playfully;
> cf.
> to pull a person's leg at PULL v. Phrases 13a
> --
>
> Martin
>
"Martin" <[email protected]> a écrit dans le message de news:
[email protected]...
> On Sun, 21 Jan 2007 17:06:02 +0100, Erick T. Barkhuis
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>
>>> It's too late. Certainly it is time to start to fix the damage but it
>>> is too late to avert the coming climatic changes.
>>
>>Wladiwostok
>
> A Plonker [OED]
>
> 2. slang (chiefly Brit. and Austral.).
>
> a. The penis. Also in extended use.
> to pull a person's plonker: to deceive a person humorously or playfully;
> cf.
> to pull a person's leg at PULL v. Phrases 13a
> --
>
> Martin
>
