[Vision2020] Game Over for the Climate

[Art Deco]

You are using 3.3 mm rise per year as a basis for your projections.

While there is still a great deal of speculation about the subject, it
appears that this rate is rising, and rising at a rate faster than was
projected just three years ago.  The latest findings having to do with the
melting of Antarctic ice from below.  Even three years ago the expected
change in rate per year rise is climbing rapidly.

http://www.skepticalscience.com/predicting-future-sea-level-rise.html
[Last updated three years ago]

http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2012/0509/Warm-water-threatens-vast-Anatarctic-ice-shelf-video
[Antarctic Ice Melt]

Here are two parts of many of the problem your analysis faces:

1.  Average temperature of the earth's surface during the Pliocene Era
[5.332 million to
2.588<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pliocene#cite_note-ICS2009-1>million
years ago] is only a controversial guess and since no comprehensive
measurements of such temperatures were available.   The size of this era
makes any generalization about long range projections of little value since
it appears that there were numerous global climate/temperature changes
during this lengthy period [2.744 million years].

2.  Since the Pliocene Era, continental drift and associated geological
changes has greatly changed the configurations of land and sea that affect
climate.  Without factoring in these changes, projections based purely on
this era are likely subject to considerable error.

I do not pretend to be an expert on this subject, but I have been following
it since a Geology Class in 1972.   I have personally seen the a great deal
of glacial ice loss in the Canadian Rockies of which I have been a frequent
visitor since 1950.  Perhaps Ted Moffett can offer some insight here.

w.

On Thu, May 10, 2012 at 6:30 PM, Paul Rumelhart <godshatter at yahoo.com>wrote:

>
> I must think differently than most people.  When I see somebody say "The
> world is going to end!  We're all going to die!  But, wait!  I have a
> PLAN!"  I immediately become skeptical.  Doesn't mean he's wrong, it just
> means that I'm going to assume he's exaggerating for effect unless I find
> out otherwise.
>
>
> I don't have a lot of time tonight to go through this, but let's take a
> quick look at the Pliocene era.  Here's what James Hansen says:
>
> "If we were to fully exploit this new oil source, and continue to burn our
> conventional oil, gas and coal<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/c/coal/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>supplies, concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere eventually
> would reach levels higher than in the Pliocene era, more than 2.5 million
> years ago, when sea level was at least 50 feet higher than it is now. That
> level of heat-trapping gases would assure that the disintegration of the
> ice sheets would accelerate out of control. Sea levels would rise and
> destroy coastal cities. Global temperatures would become intolerable.
> Twenty to 50 percent of the planet’s species would be driven to extinction.
> Civilization would be at risk. "
>
> So I did some quick research.  The sources I found have the CO2 levels
> somewhere between 350 and 400 ppm during this period, which we are indeed
> just passing now.  The odd thing is that the temperature during the
> Pliocene was about 2-3C warmer than it is today, even at CO2 levels equal
> to today's levels.  This was back in the day when CO2 levels followed
> temperature, by the way, since there were no evil humans driving SUVs.
> This is a open question in geology, apparently.  This is actually good
> news, since the Earth did not accelerate into a hothouse world due to
> positive feedbacks driven by the loss of the Arctic ice pack (it hadn't yet
> formed, which is why the sea level was higher).  In fact, 2.5 Mya is the
> onset of the Pleistocene, during which the Earth was slid into an Ice Age
> with short periods of warmth interspersed among long periods of glaciation,
> the last one ending 15000 years ago or so.  The CO2 level during this
> period (the Pleistocene) fluctuated between 100 and 300 ppm.  Only lately
> have they been as high as they are now (~394 ppm).  Given that fact, it
> makes me wonder if we don't need higher CO2 levels to prevent us from
> slipping into another Ice Age, since these same levels were not enough to
> stop the last one even though temperatures were warmer than now, and the
> Arctic ice pack did not yet exist.
>
> As one of the premier climate scientists, I suspect that James Hansen
> knows all this.  My conclusion: he wanted to use the 50ft sea level rise
> number as a scare tactic.  Sea level rise, even at the worst estimate
> provided by the IPCC, would take 4618 years to raise 50ft, by my
> calculations (50ft = 15240 mm / 3.3 mm/yr = 4618 years).
>
> Paul
>
>
> On 05/10/2012 04:46 PM, Art Deco wrote:
>
> First, notice this is an OP/ED article.
>
> Second, notice that Hansen presents a lot of facts, then makes predictions
> on that basis.
>
> Hence, if you want to dispute his facts, do so.
>
> If you want to dispute the probability of his conclusions based on the
> facts presented or alternative facts, do so.
>
> However, he has a right, and perhaps even a moral obligation given the
> seriousness of his claim, to present warnings to the world.
>
> Scientists do what Hansen is doing all the time, and have been do so for a
> long time.  The most common cases are about the consequences of using
> various prescription drugs, OTC drugs, and nutrients, medical devices,
> fillings, medical procedures, etc.
>
> All scientific theories are probabilistic, and therefore opinions --
> opinions hopefully based on probabilities based on careful research and
> reasoning.  Scientific theories predict impacts on all of us.  They ought
> be put into the market place of ideas for all of us to evaluate.
>
> "Leave the rest to politicians."  Are you fucking out of your mind?  Are
> you not aware of what egregious messes contemporary politicians have gotten
> us into, and how little regard they have for the truth and the overall well
> being of human kind?
>
> w.
>
> On Thu, May 10, 2012 at 1:26 PM, Paul Rumelhart <godshatter at yahoo.com>wrote:
>
>>  I remember a day when scientists used to stick to the facts.  They
>> would say things like "we can't tell you what to do, but we can tell you
>> that our analyses have shown that this and this and this are likely with
>> this level of uncertainty".  Nowadays, scientists are fricking political
>> activists.  They give their opinions in articles in Rolling Stone and
>> charge big sums of money for speaking engagements at various venues, and
>> get arrested for protesting oil pipelines.
>>
>>  Can James Hansen show with scientific certainty that his plan would
>> keep all the alarmist predictions of disaster at bay and then it would no
>> longer be "game over"?  What is the scientific definition of "game over"?
>> Climate scientists need to, in my opinion, take back their scientific
>> neutrality.  Here's what we've found, here's what our degree of confidence
>> is.  Leave the rest to the politicians.
>>
>>  It's statements like "the science of the situation is clear — it’s time
>> for the politics to follow" that make me immediately skeptical of
>> everything he says.
>>
>>  Paul
>>
>>    ------------------------------
>> *From:* Art Deco <art.deco.studios at gmail.com>
>> *To:* vision2020 at moscow.com
>> *Sent:* Thursday, May 10, 2012 11:49 AM
>> *Subject:* [Vision2020] Game Over for the Climate
>>
>>   [image: The New York Times] <http://www.nytimes.com/>
>>
>> <http://www.nytimes.com/adx/bin/adx_click.html?type=goto&opzn&page=www.nytimes.com/printer-friendly&pos=Position1&sn2=336c557e/4f3dd5d2&sn1=cc8f29dd/870b4e4f&camp=FSL2012_ArticleTools_120x60_1787506c_nyt5&ad=BOSW_120x60_May4_NoText&goto=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Efoxsearchlight%2Ecom%2Fbeastsofthesouthernwild>
>>
>> ------------------------------
>> May 9, 2012
>> Game Over for the Climate By JAMES HANSEN
>>  GLOBAL warming isn’t a prediction. It is happening. That is why I was so
>> troubled to read a recent interview with President Obama<http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2012/04/i-have-the-utmost-respect-for.html>in Rolling Stone in which he said that
>> Canada<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/canada/index.html?inline=nyt-geo>would exploit the
>> oil<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/energy-environment/oil-petroleum-and-gasoline/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>in its vast tar sands reserves “regardless of what we do.”
>>  If Canada proceeds, and we do nothing, it will be game over for the
>> climate.
>>  Canada’s tar sands, deposits of sand saturated with bitumen, contain
>> twice the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by global oil use in our entire
>> history. If we were to fully exploit this new oil source, and continue to
>> burn our conventional oil, gas and coal<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/c/coal/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>supplies, concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere eventually
>> would reach levels higher than in the Pliocene era, more than 2.5 million
>> years ago, when sea level was at least 50 feet higher than it is now. That
>> level of heat-trapping gases would assure that the disintegration of the
>> ice sheets would accelerate out of control. Sea levels would rise and
>> destroy coastal cities. Global temperatures would become intolerable.
>> Twenty to 50 percent of the planet’s species would be driven to extinction.
>> Civilization would be at risk.
>>  That is the long-term outlook. But near-term, things will be bad enough.
>> Over the next several decades, the Western United States and the semi-arid
>> region from North Dakota to Texas will develop semi-permanent drought, with
>> rain, when it does come, occurring in extreme events with heavy flooding.
>> Economic losses would be incalculable. More and more of the Midwest would
>> be a dust bowl. California’s Central Valley could no longer be irrigated. Food
>> prices<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/f/food_prices/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>would rise to unprecedented levels.
>>  If this sounds apocalyptic, it is. This is why we need to reduce
>> emissions dramatically. President Obama has the power not only to deny tar
>> sands oil additional access to Gulf Coast refining, which Canada desires in
>> part for export markets, but also to encourage economic incentives to leave
>> tar sands and other dirty fuels in the ground.
>>  The global warming<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/science/topics/globalwarming/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>signal is now louder than the noise of random weather, as I predicted would
>> happen by now in the journal Science in 1981. Extremely hot summers have
>> increased noticeably. We can say with high confidence that the recent heat
>> waves in Texas and Russia, and the one in Europe in 2003, which killed tens
>> of thousands, were not natural events — they were caused by human-induced
>> climate change.
>>  We have known since the 1800s that carbon dioxide traps heat in the
>> atmosphere. The right amount keeps the climate conducive to human life. But
>> add too much, as we are doing now, and temperatures will inevitably rise
>> too high. This is not the result of natural variability, as some argue. The
>> earth is currently in the part of its long-term orbit cycle where
>> temperatures would normally be cooling. But they are rising — and it’s
>> because we are forcing them higher with fossil fuel emissions.
>>  The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen from 280
>> parts per million to 393 p.p.m. over the last 150 years. The tar sands
>> contain enough carbon — 240 gigatons — to add 120 p.p.m. Tar shale, a close
>> cousin of tar sands found mainly in the United States, contains at least an
>> additional 300 gigatons of carbon. If we turn to these dirtiest of fuels,
>> instead of finding ways to phase out our addiction to fossil fuels, there
>> is no hope of keeping carbon concentrations below 500 p.p.m. — a level that
>> would, as earth’s history shows, leave our children a climate system that
>> is out of their control.
>>  We need to start reducing emissions significantly, not create new ways
>> to increase them. We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected
>> from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections
>> to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. The government would
>> not get a penny. This market-based approach would stimulate innovation,
>> jobs and economic growth, avoid enlarging government or having it pick
>> winners or losers. Most Americans, except the heaviest energy users, would
>> get more back than they paid in increased prices. Not only that, the
>> reduction in oil use resulting from the carbon price would be nearly six
>> times as great as the oil supply from the proposed pipeline from Canada,
>> rendering the pipeline superfluous, according to economic models driven by
>> a slowly rising carbon price.
>>  But instead of placing a rising fee on carbon emissions to make fossil
>> fuels pay their true costs, leveling the energy playing field, the world’s
>> governments are forcing the public to subsidize fossil fuels with hundreds
>> of billions of dollars per year. This encourages a frantic stampede to
>> extract every fossil fuel through mountaintop removal, longwall mining,
>> hydraulic fracturing, tar sands and tar shale extraction, and deep ocean
>> and Arctic drilling.
>>  President Obama speaks of a “planet in peril,” but he does not provide
>> the leadership needed to change the world’s course. Our leaders must speak
>> candidly to the public — which yearns for open, honest discussion —
>> explaining that our continued technological leadership and economic
>> well-being demand a reasoned change of our energy course. History has shown
>> that the American public can rise to the challenge, but leadership is
>> essential.
>>  The science of the situation is clear — it’s time for the politics to
>> follow. This is a plan that can unify conservatives and liberals,
>> environmentalists and business. Every major national science academy in the
>> world has reported that global warming is real, caused mostly by humans,
>> and requires urgent action. The cost of acting goes far higher the longer
>> we wait — we can’t wait any longer to avoid the worst and be judged immoral
>> by coming generations.
>>  James Hansen <http://www.giss.nasa.gov/staff/jhansen.html> directs the
>> NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and is the author of “Storms of My
>> Grandchildren.”
>>
>> Room for Debate: Should Churches Get Tax Breaks?<http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/05/09/should-churches-get-tax-breaks?src=un&feedurl=http%3A%2F%2Fjson8.nytimes.com%2Fpages%2Fopinion%2Findex.jsonp>
>>   --
>> Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
>> art.deco.studios at gmail.com
>>
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>
>
> --
> Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
> art.deco.studios at gmail.com
>
>
> =======================================================
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>
>


-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com
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