+- +-

+-User

Welcome, Guest.
Please login or register.
 
 
 

Login with your social network

Forgot your password?

+-Stats ezBlock

Members
Total Members: 48
Latest: watcher
New This Month: 0
New This Week: 0
New Today: 0
Stats
Total Posts: 16867
Total Topics: 271
Most Online Today: 141
Most Online Ever: 1208
(March 28, 2024, 07:28:27 am)
Users Online
Members: 0
Guests: 117
Total: 117

Author Topic: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️  (Read 117117 times)

0 Members and 13 Guests are viewing this topic.

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #675 on: October 08, 2016, 12:00:10 pm »
Climate| Oct. 06, 2016 03:00PM EST

Is the Media to Blame for Climate Inaction?  ???

Carl Pope

For years climate reporting had two strands: climate science got more alarming as we got closer and closer to exceeding various warming thresholds, and climate diplomacy and public policy were a relatively unbroken saga of disappointment and delay.

The media flocks to bad news, conflict, grid-lock, failure. Both strands of the pre-2014 climate story nourished this appetite. Since 2014, however, the climate story grew more complex, hopeful—but harder for the media to summarize. Greenhouse gas concentrations continue to grow at an alarming rate; projections of the risks of these concentrations become steadily graver, more bad news. So this week we were told that the planet was hotter than it has been in the last 100,000 years.

Current climate commitments fall far short of what is needed to avoid catastrophe—which causes concerned observers to argue that the world is not taking the problem seriously.

But on the solutions front, progress is accelerating. Climate diplomacy and public policy are not only galloping ahead at an unprecedented speed, their pace is increasing. We are in danger of not realizing that.

The media doesn't know how to cover a story that is headed in two directions, so it's unlikely that this week will be reported as a huge turning point in the fight for climate protectionbut it was.

First, with ratification by the EU of the Paris agreement came into legally binding force, five years earlier than originally envisaged. Media coverage of this possibility has focused on one defensive motivation, the desire to ensure that a potential Trump Administration could not pull the U.S. out. But that fear moved ratification up only a few months. It's clear that the major emitters wanted to ratify Paris in early 2017 at the latest, a step which not only locks in the U.S. but also accelerates all of the processes embodied in the bottom up Paris agreement—a critically important factor in maximizing the odds that the next round of global commitments , due in 2019, are as ambitious as possible.

Second
, next week in Kigali, the world for the first time is poised to commit to the total phase out of one of the six major climate pollutants, HFC refrigerants. While these chemicals—an unintended consequence of the Montreal Protocol phase out of ozone layer destroying chemicals which the HFC's replaced—have thus far contributed only a small part of overheating to date, their use is growing rapidly, their phase out is expected to cut mid-century temperatures by a startling .5-1 degrees, avoiding the emissions of HFC's with the warming potential of 200 billion tons of CO2.

Third, the global community for the first time established an effective global emission limit for an entire sector of the economy, flying. At the Montreal meeting of the International Civil Aviation Organization, 60 countries representing 80 percent of the world's aviation agreed to cap global emissions from air travel at the 2019-2020 level, requiring emissions growth after that date to be offset. There are significant limitations to this agreement—we will need to phase out all emissions by 2050 not just emissions growth. There are concerns that the use of offsets, while offering a promising funding mechanisms to reduce deforestation, postpones the problem of eliminating aviation's reliance on fossil fuels. This is still a powerful precedent, and the airline industry overall actually favored a faster timeline.

Canada, which only a year ago was viewed as a major barrier to climate progress, became the first industrial nation outside the EU to embrace a national carbon price, putting in place one of the ingredients for a eventual global financial regime capable of achieving a decarbonized world economy by 2050.

The Netherlands concluded it would shut down its almost brand new fleet of coal power plants, because the nation could not meet its Paris climate pledge without doing so.

These events are being covered by the media, but in a low-key, low intensity way —and the press won't be jumping up and down and pointing out to the things that didn't happen—and whose absence is enabling the building momentum behind climate progress:

•The Polish government, which badly wants to delay the fading of coal from the EU's energy mix, didn't choose to blockade early EU ratification of the Paris agreement.

•A fractious, challenging U.S.-China relationship on security issues was not allowed to get in the way of the two countries coming together on the aviation deal in Montreal.

•India's legitimate anger at the U.S. over how the Trade Representative is handling WTO complaints against India's efforts to build its domestic solar industry did not yield to India either refusing to ratify Paris this year or its declining to permit the phase out of HFC's.

•The major developing countries agreed, voluntarily, to participate in capping aviation climate pollution, when they still have many important reforms they are still seeking on climate finance from the industrial world.

•Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau chose to commit his government to carbon pricing without waiting for the reluctant, slower Provincial governments like Manitoba to agree.

•The Dutch government did not hide behind Europe's post-Brexit financial uncertainties to delay the decision on shutting down its coal plants.

Per se, road blocks not thrown up, or excuses for delay not offered, don't solve the problem. But they are significant and consequential signals that countries, including the biggest emitters and the historic laggards, are now serious above moving forward. And since forward momentum in the climate space creates its own tail winds (through economies of deployment), this first round of speed will turbo-charge the next round, giving us a serious shot of meet the de-carbonization imperative.

This week is what momentum feels like—and we need to find a way to better celebrate momentum, because it is the single process with the best shot of rescuing a stable climate.

http://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change-media-2033063230.html
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #676 on: October 08, 2016, 12:21:27 pm »
Nice video model of projected interaction between Matthew and Nicole with "Fujiwara Effect".

Matthew looks like it will come around for another strafing run, although the projection is for it to weaken.

RE


http://www.businessinsider.com/hurricane-matthew-loop-hit-florida-twice-2016-10

It's looking likelier that Hurricane Matthew could pummel Florida twice

    Rafi Letzter


Hurricane Matthew, poised to become a historic and dangerous storm for Florida as it advances toward the state, could actually strike the peninsula twice in the next several days.

The storm's outer bands are already being feltelt in Florida, and it's expected to make landfall early Friday and cause massive flooding over the weekend from Florida to South Carolina. Then it should turn out to sea Sunday.

But here's the thing: Another storm is on Matthew's heels, Hurricane Nicole. And the way they interact could have consequences along the peninsula.

Screen Shot 2016 10 06 at 2.59.56 PMNOAA

It's now looking more likely that smaller, Category 1 Nicole would push and push on Matthew, shoving the bigger storm back toward land even as it tries to move out over the water. The result could be Matthew doing a full loop — and making landfall in Florida twice. Here's how a storm model predicts that would look:

As Jason Samenow at The Washington Post reported Wednesday, when a loop was still an outlandish possibility, it's very difficult to predict exactly how tropical cyclones will interact with one another. But typically they either repel or "orbit" one another because of a phenomenon known as the "Fujiwhara effect."

A few other storms have turned loops before, but it's rare. Some models predicted Hurricane Hermine would turn a loop earlier this year, but that turned out not to happen.

The most recent example of the Fujiwhara effect was in 1995, when Hurricane Iris interacted with Hurricane Humberto and then absorbed Tropical Storm Karen.

If Matthew does strike twice, it would almost certainly return as a much weaker storm, probably at tropical storm strength.

At this point, to prepare for the major strike coming on Friday, Floridians should continue to evacuate or bunker down, depending on local advisories. And residents in Florida and throughout the Southeast US should continue to follow weather reports as the storm gets closer
. [/size]

Great find!       My wife was just mentioning this to me today. She had previously suggested to me that the two storms could merge. She told me about the Fujiwara Effect. I had no idea they had a name for it.  :-[
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #677 on: October 08, 2016, 01:30:48 pm »
How Matthew and Nicole have lowered ocean temperature

If you go to the following web site and get the  3 and 8 day averages, you will see how much hotter the ocean under the two hurricanes was prior to their passing.  8)

https://www.ceoe.udel.edu/our-people/profiles/moliver/orb-lab/real-time-sea-surface-temperatures/orb-lab-maracoos-sst-east-coast

Remember folks, the hotter the oceans get, the more hurricanes will form because hurricanes are the WAY (aside from normal evaporation) the oceans rid themselves of heat. OVER 85% of global warming caused by the burning of fossil fuels has been absorbed by the oceans.

Anyone who thinks this is not going to get MUCH WORSE is a fool, a moron or an employee of the fossil fuel industry (but I repeat myself).
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #678 on: October 08, 2016, 02:09:11 pm »
WATCH: Hurricane Hunters Fly Into Eye of Hurricane Matthew   :o

October 7, 2016 by Mike Schuler

Check out this amazing video showing a crew of NOAA Hurricane Hunters fly through the eye wall and into the eye of Hurricane Matthew aboard a WP-3D Orion aircraft.

https://gcaptain.com/watch-hurricane-hunters-fly-eye-hurricane-matthew/
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #679 on: October 09, 2016, 04:51:09 pm »
Truthdigger of the Week: Sir Robert Watson  , British Climate Expert 
Posted on Oct 8, 2016

By Alexander Reed Kelly

Every week the Truthdig editorial staff selects a Truthdigger of the Week, a group or person worthy of recognition for speaking truth to power, breaking the story or blowing the whistle. It is not a lifetime achievement award. Rather, we’re looking for newsmakers whose actions in a given week are worth celebrating.

Roughly 200 years after humans sparked global warming, Sir Robert Watson and his colleagues at the Universal Ecological Fund addressed the public about climate change with a clarity that is rare for major institutions. “Climate change is happening now,” the international group of climate scientists wrote in a report titled “The Truth About Climate Change.” And it’s happening “much faster than anticipated.”

The scientists are attempting to correct the impression that climate change is a far-off problem, when in fact it’s playing out right now.

How did we get here? The “urgency of climate change has been misunderstood by most,” the group continues. Authoritative bodies such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) produce reliable studies, but the vast majority of the public doesn’t hear from the scientific community directly. In addition, the group says, “Information from these other sources has often been confusing for the public.” And to compound the problem, “there has been deliberate misinformation from deniers and sectors with vested interests in maintaining the current situation.”


 

Indeed, journalists recently showed that executives at ExxonMobil knew about the dangers of climate change 40 years ago and kept their knowledge a secret. In September, U.S. environmental activist Bill McKibben said that the public must “check the power of the fossil fuel industry. … It’s going to take an immense amount of work, but if we don’t win, then there won’t be any future.”

ExxonMobil spent as much as $10 million per year between 1998 and 2005 to spread misinformation about climate change, and after pledging to stop funding “denial” groups, executives continued to back the American Legislative Exchange Council and members of Congress who obstructed legislation aimed at curbing practices that cause climate change.

ExxonMobil and other oil companies succeeded splendidly at confusing people.  :( “This miscommunication of climate change has created some misunderstandings in the public, which has led many to perceive climate change as abstract, distant and even controversial,” the UEF scientists continued. “As a result, what is actually happening with the climate and the immediate actions required to address climate change have been misunderstood.” Many people, for instance, have been convinced that burning coal, gas and oil is essential to economic growth, as if the production and maintenance of wind turbines and solar panels doesn’t create jobs.

Despite their work, many experts—including the IPCC—have fallen short of their commitment to the truth in relationship to the public. British climate scientist Peter Wadhams criticized his fellow scientists in September for failing to fully represent the dangers of climate change to the public. They “were too frightened of [losing] their jobs or losing their grants to spell out what was really happening,” he told Climate News Network. Wadhams cites measurements he took personally to predict that ice in the Arctic will disappear in the summers by 2020—30 years ahead of IPCC estimates.

Quote
“They know it is happening, but they do not want to frighten the horses,” Wadhams said. “It is bordering on the dishonest.”

Watson and company don’t sugarcoat the facts; they plainly describe what must be done to avert the worst effects of climate change. If implemented and improved upon, the decisions made at the United Nations climate conference in Paris at the end of 2016 “will affect and benefit all of us. Over the next few years, we will have to produce energy from low-carbon sources, use energy more efficiently, travel less and even change our diets. The climate will still continue to change and we will continue to experience unusual weather everywhere.” Europe, for example, faces high winds and flooding estimated to cost more than $210 billion annually by 2070, in addition to the many lives likely to be lost if infrastructure is not updated to account for the frequency and intensity of storms.

Though the Paris accord established an international “pledge and review” system for monitoring signatory countries’ efforts to oppose climate change, the efforts are only reviewed every five years, and “current pledges” are “far from sufficient to put the world on a pathway to meet the average temperature rise target of 2 degrees Celsius,” according to the UEF report. Though temperatures have risen by about 1 degree on average, a delay by decades in the heating effect of atmospheric carbon means the amount of carbon already in the atmosphere is enough to rise 1½ degrees Celsius. And because any global target temperature rise is an average, a 2 degree rise would be devastating, as much of the world would undergo a rise of 3 degrees or more. Moreover, the agreement’s nonbinding international pledges are “subject to approval at the national level through policies, regulations and incentives for their implementation in each country. Thus, pledges may be changed, raising or reducing the overall [greenhouse gas] emission reduction targets.”

Getting to net zero carbon emissions could be achieved with the rapid build-out of renewable energy infrastructure, a doubling of the earth’s forest cover, carbon capture and storage technology, and machines that remove carbon from the atmosphere, the authors wrote. But many technologies are unproven at a large scale and others remain to be developed.

“As the number of weather-related events due to climate change continues to rise, their impact on water resources, food production, human health, services and infrastructure in urban and rural areas, among other sectors, will be more frequent and intense,” the authors continue. “Some of the impacts of climate change may be beneficial, while most will not, negatively impacting lives and livelihoods everywhere.”

But there is reason to hope, so long as hope is joined with action. “There is still time to slow down the current path towards reaching the 2 degree C target within the next few decades,” the authors conclude. “First, and most importantly, there are still four years before the implementation of the [pledges] in 2020. By 2018, all countries agreed to revise their pledges—sufficient time to significantly raise the ambition of actions to reduce [greenhouse gas] emissions and to adopt the necessary policies for their effective implementation in all countries. Second, the IPCC has already committed to improving its communications to make their reports more accessible for the public to understand.”

Will the IPCC get better at informing the public? With pressure from the likes of Watson, it may. For this reason, Sir Robert Watson is our Truthdigger of the Week. 

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/truthdigger_of_the_week_sir_robert_watson_british_climate_expert_20161008
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #680 on: October 11, 2016, 06:35:46 pm »
Hurricane Matthew: Unwrapping the Tinfoil

October 11, 2016
 
 Hurricane Matthew wasn’t an ordinary storm. It killed more than a thousand people in Haiti and at least 30 in the US. Its trail of widespread devastation was shocking and it will take the affected regions time to recover.
 
 But while 1.5 million people were being asked by Republican governors to head to safety for the fear for their lives, Matt Drudge wondered if the government was lying to its people to “make an exaggerated point on climate.” During the time when the hurricane-related death toll in Haiti jumped from 20 to more than 300, Drudge questioned the National Hurricane Center’s data in a now-infamous tweet. Several people (such as Jason Samenow of WaPo and Libby Nelson of Vox) wrote against his outrageous claims for not only trying to score cheap political gains but also putting lives in danger.
 
 Not to be outdone, Rush Limbaugh also accused the government of “hyping Hurricane Matthew to sell climate change,” earning the ire of even the Daily Dot.
 
 Without having any other evidence to disprove the solid climate science linking Hurricane Matthew to climate change, the denial community has been repeating one fact ad nauseam – the arbitrarily defined “major hurricane drought.” It’s a classic case of cherry-picking data that trivializes the lives disrupted and lost by major storms like Matthew, Sandy and others.
 
 While the US has been fortunate that no hurricane has made landfall in the past decade as a Cat 3 or higher, the fact remains that hurricane activity in the Atlantic basin has increased since the 1970s. And there is also increasing evidence that landfalling typhoons in Asia have become more intense over the last four decades due to warmer waters. Politifact has a great article on this subject.
 
 From the time it became apparent that the hurricane would seriously impact the US, everyone swung into action. Experts examined climate signals to understand in advance what potential impacts might be. Governors announced states of emergency and mandated evacuations. Climate deniers peddled conspiracy theories.

 While most stocked up on food and water, deniers  were content with tin foil.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #681 on: October 11, 2016, 08:04:22 pm »
Fracking is a form of climate-change denial 

Josh Fox

Local communities are showing the courage to fight fossil fuel madness. We can all help them prevail.

Monday 10 October 2016 15.39 EDT  Last modified on Tuesday 11 October 2016 06.04 EDT 

Here’s one thing we don’t often want to admit: it is too late to stop many of the harshest and most destructive aspects of climate change from materialising. We’re out of time. Superstorms, droughts, floods, disappearing islands, coastlines and lost species are already here.

We need to face the fact that the climate crisis is upon us, and that the greenhouse gases we’ve already emitted have locked in even worse that’s yet to come. The mass deaths in Haiti and the evacuation of 1.5 million people from the Florida coast in the wake of Hurricane Matthew is just the kind of weather-related event that we can expect to happen more frequently in a warmer world.

So what do we need to do? Run and cower in the corner? Accept futile half-measures? No, courage is what the movement fighting climate change and fossil fuels needs most now. Lack of courage by western governments is having devastating consequences, and in the case of America, one of them is fracking. This is the unacceptable “solution” to the climate crisis that the US has been pushing all across the world. The decision by the British government last week to overturn Lancashire’s rejection of fracking shows that the UK  , too, seems to be falling for it.

 
Fracking sites


Our movement and our scientists, by contrast, do have the courage to identify what needs to be done. Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org, estimates that we have 17 years to replace all fossil fuel infrastructure with renewable energy. That means no new fossil fuel projects. Period. We burn down what we have, and we build renewable energy sources as fast as we can. That means no new pipelines, no new fracking fields, no new offshore drilling, no new tar sands or coal mines.

That would mean no new fracking in the US or the UK. You cannot be a climate leader and support fracking: it is a new form of climate denialism. One only has to look at the brave stand people all across the world are taking to fight fossil fuel developments to see the kind of courage our governments lack but that the future will demand. Britain has seen protests in Balcombe in West Sussex, and in Blackpool, while in the US we have had brave pipeline fighters in Nebraska and Standing Rock reservation, North Dakota.

The neoliberal promise that we can both prevent catastrophic warming and allow energy companies to get rich extracting and burning more fossil fuels, including shale gas, is a fallacy. We can’t. Yet the US State Department’s shale gas initiative is seeking to expand fracking to other countries, even when their citizens don’t want it. The UK’s Institute of Gas Engineers and Managers, IGEM, cites it as a model for the world, and now Britain is seeking to import its own US-style fracking boom.

The world Obama is referring to is something else, in which fossil fuel lobbyists obscure the will of the people.

The Lancashire decision will have to be fought off with passion, enthusiasm and courage. This means putting ourselves and, yes, sometimes our bodies on the line to stop this march of fossil fuel madness.

Last week, even as superstorm Matthew bore down on America’s east coast, Barack Obama said at the premiere of Leonardo DiCaprio’s new climate change film that keeping fossil fuels in the ground isn’t practical, and that we have to accept fracking as a way to cut emissions because “we have to live in the real world”. 


The real world, I assume, is the one that science is describing – that says we cannot develop more fossil fuels. The world Obama is referring to is something else – a bubble – in which fossil fuel lobbyists obscure the will of the people under their superstorm of campaign cash and political influence.   
 
We can’t afford to dig up the fossil fuel deposits we’ve already developed, let alone develop new ones, especially shale gas. Some peer-reviewed research finds that shale gas is worse for the climate than coal or oil, because fracking and transporting it emits massive quantities of methane, which is over 80 times more powerful a warming agent than carbon dioxide over 20 years.

Those are the same 20 years in which we must replace our fossil fuel infrastructure with renewables to have a fighting chance against catastrophic warming. I recently filmed activists in China risking their freedom to speak out against coal; indigenous people deep in the Amazon confronting the ravages of oil companies; Pacific Climate Warriors blockading coal tankers with canoes, chanting: “We are not drowning – we are fighting!” We all need their courage and inventiveness now. The climate movement can prevail against the odds if it has enough bravery, community resilience, creativity, awareness of rights, and love. Luckily these are the things climate can’t change.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/oct/10/fracking-climate-change-denial-fight-fossil-fuel-madness

Agelbert NOTE: Fracking accelerates climate catastrophe, but it will endanger something else in England (and France), if the UK is fracked. What I am talking about is that fracking causes minor earthquake activity. Increased tectonic activity was NOT part of the future scenario envisioned by the engineers who built the chunnel under the English channel.

The PATH of the chunnel had to be very precise because the rock layer they needed to tunnel through has unstable bands both above and below it.




Therefore, the chunnel is particularly susceptible to LEAKS from increased earthquake activity (new fissures opening up above or below the chunnel rock band).  The Frackers will swear up and down that the 14 billion dollar chunnel will not be endangered by fracking caused seismic activity. They are LIARS.

Watch the video on how the chunnel was made (several people lost there lives in the effort) and learn WHY that chunnel is NOT designed to handle increased seismic activity. Also, please pass this on to anyone you know in England.


The precautionary principle of science must be applied here and NO FRACKING must be allowed in the U.K.


If Fracking is allowed in the U.K., the consequences will be disastrous.
« Last Edit: October 15, 2016, 04:59:13 pm by AGelbert »
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #682 on: October 14, 2016, 01:24:40 pm »
Climate| Oct. 13, 2016 11:47AM EST

Massive Iceberg Breaks Off Glacier in 'Biggest Calving Event in North America' in 33 Years

Dan Zukowski

A nearly three-quarter-square-mile chunk of ice broke off the Porcupine Glacier in British Columbia this summer, but it was only detected recently when the National Aeronautics and Space Administration posted a satellite image of the area. Glaciologist Mauri Pelto called it "the biggest calving event in North America" that he has ever seen.

Quote
The breakup at Porcupine is the largest single iceberg (by area) to calve from a North American glacier in recent decades. NASA Earth Observatory] (graphic at article link)


The Porcupine Glacier, a 12-mile-long tongue of an ice field in the Hoodoo Mountains of Northern British Columbia, has been studied for many years. From 1985 to 2005, researchers saw a reduction of 0.3 percent a year. The glacier has also been thinning, at a rate of about 2.5 inches per year. As it melts, it grows a lake at the end of the glacier.

Quote

"The volume loss has been speeding up in these glaciers," Pelto told The Globe and Mail.

The Landsat 8 satellite passed over Porcupine Glacier on Aug. 27 revealing the breakaway ice as compared to an image made two days earlier. Dr. Pelto, who has been analyzing satellite imagery of the area's glaciers since the 1980s, said the Porcupine Glacier event is part of a broader trend in which glaciers are retreating rapidly. This summer's sudden calving event shrunk the glacier back a full mile.

Pelto is a professor of environmental science at Nichols College in Dudley, Massachusetts, a small town on the Connecticut border south of Worcester. Pelto has been making field trips to the North Cascades every year since 1983 and uses satellite images to see the larger view.

"Without the images, we would just have the isolated point measurements of ground truth at specific times," Pelto said.

This calving event would have been unlike those often seen in Alaska, where a large section of ice crashes dramatically into the sea. The Porcupine Glacier features a low slope, so the iceberg would have simply slid into the lake.

"It would have been more like if you're pushing off from the shore in a canoe. It didn't break off and fall in," Pelto explained.

During his three decades of research, Pelto has also observed a large number of new alpine lakes being formed and expanded as glaciers have retreated in the Alps, Himalayas, Andes, North America, New Zealand, and Norway. He has also witnessed new islands revealed off the coast of Greenland and Novaya Zemlya that had been hidden under ice for thousands of years.

The U.S. Geological Survey says that Alaska's glaciers are losing 75 billion tons of ice each year. That's an amount of water that would fill Yankee Stadium 150,000 times, year after year.


http://www.ecowatch.com/iceberg-calving-british-columbia-glacier-2043759021.html
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #683 on: November 01, 2016, 10:09:09 pm »

Listen to 58 years of climate change in one minute

BY John Ryan, KUOW Public Radio   October 31, 2016 at 2:10 PM EDT

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/listen-58-years-climate-change-one-minute/
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #684 on: November 04, 2016, 06:04:32 pm »
Quote
"This generation has altered the composition of the atmosphere on a global scale through radioactive materials and a steady increase in carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels."

-- President Lyndon B. Johnson, Feb. 2, 1965

Quote

"God always forgives, but the earth does not. Take care of the earth so it does not respond with destruction,"

 -- Pope Francis, at a UN conference in Rome, Nov. 19, 2014
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #685 on: November 05, 2016, 01:44:11 pm »
The earth forgives too, but she doesn't forgive on a timeline most humans can relate to......LOL.

That's debatable Eddie. I'm no scientist,  but there is some real bad destruction going on it seems. It would appear to me that somethings are destroyed forever in the true sense, like a particular species let's say.

Well said. I agree 100%. Much of the damage already done, and in the process of occurring, is not reversible, at least not in our lifetimes.  :(

The following article discusses one of the MANY types of fossil fuel industry caused lethal pollution impacting our biosphere 24/7:

Energy| Nov. 01, 2016 01:59PM EST

How Fracking Impacts Water-Stressed Regions


SNIPPET:

Ceres researchers mapped water use in hydraulic fracturing across the U.S., using data from FracFocus.org and the World Resources Institute, and found that 57 percent of hydraulically fractured oil and gas wells between Jan. 1, 2011 and Jan. 1, 2016 were in regions of high water competition.

Our newly released interactive map shows water use by shale play and operator. Check it out:

http://www.ecowatch.com/impact-fracking-water-2074553674.html

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #686 on: November 05, 2016, 03:40:37 pm »
The earth forgives too, but she doesn't forgive on a timeline most humans can relate to......LOL.

That's debatable Eddie. I'm no scientist,  but there is some real bad destruction going on it seems. It would appear to me that somethings are destroyed forever in the true sense, like a particular species let's say.

Well said. I agree 100%. Much of the damage already done, and in the process of occurring, is not reversible, at least not in our lifetimes.  :(

The following article discusses one of the MANY types of fossil fuel industry caused lethal pollution impacting our biosphere 24/7:

Energy| Nov. 01, 2016 01:59PM EST

How Fracking Impacts Water-Stressed Regions


SNIPPET:

Ceres researchers mapped water use in hydraulic fracturing across the U.S., using data from FracFocus.org and the World Resources Institute, and found that 57 percent of hydraulically fractured oil and gas wells between Jan. 1, 2011 and Jan. 1, 2016 were in regions of high water competition.

Our newly released interactive map shows water use by shale play and operator. Check it out:

http://www.ecowatch.com/impact-fracking-water-2074553674.html

I think both of you are missing the point I was trying to make. I agree with both of you that many of the planet's ecosystems and the physical environment are permanently damaged, at least from the perspective of Man, living at the top of the food chain, with His Big Brain suddenly realizing he has been shitting where he eats for far too long.

I was just thinking about what that scientist that Leo interviewed pointed out, that life on earth is not going to end. It just won't be what we've evolved into. Life will once again be slime molds floating around in really warm water.

Once man is gone for good, though, Mother Earth will immediately set about healing herself, and although the state of things will be further down the hill of entropy, the earth will once again find a way to evolve, just in some way we can't imagine.

We are horribly anthropocentric in our viewpoint. Most of us, myself included, are profoundly saddened to think of a world without humans and other higher animals. But the earth will still be here after we're gone, and some many millions of years from now, some other interesting species may walk in our ancient footsteps. At least it makes me feel better to imagine that.


Yes, we are anthropocentric, and horribly so in many ways that have harmed, and continue to harm, the biosphere we depend on. But my understanding of what the Pope was saying, and GO's understanding too, was that the earth isn't going to forgive humans. I am certain he was not referring to other species, as you point to as a form of natural forgiveness (i.e. other species that will survive our demise). The scientist that stated that lower order life (i.e. non-self aware) would always be around despite our horrendously irresponsible behavior, did not appear to be voicing a message of hope, but of warning that we must change our destructive 'business as usual' behavior once and for all.

That was the point of the Pope's saying the earth does not forgive. Why do you think GO and I missed the point?


We are as cognizant as you are of the ability of simpler, more adaptable, non-self aware species to survive our poor stewardship. I do not consider it a responsible, positive or hopeful gesture for homo sapiens to hand down a biosphere suitable for simpler, tougher organisms, considering that we have the knowledge, self-awareness, free will and the responsibility to do be sustainable stewards of our biosphere. We cannot assume that our mistakes are acceptable simply because we have so many human empathy deficit disordered polluting elite that "do what they do".

Or do you think we are an evolutionary dead end and cannot escape our ultimate demise?

I like to think we can recognize our mistakes and correct them, not for our egotistical anthropocentric good, but for our logical anthropocentric reasonable perpetuation of our species, which ultimately involves the preservation and protection of hundreds of thousands of species populating the biosphere which we depend on. Don't you agree that doing the right thing by the biosphere is our responsibility? The Pope does. GO and I agree with him.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #687 on: November 06, 2016, 02:35:20 pm »
That's debatable Eddie. I'm no scientist,  but there is some real bad destruction going on it seems. It would appear to me that somethings are destroyed forever in the true sense, like a particular species let's say.

Well said. I agree 100%. Much of the damage already done, and in the process of occurring, is not reversible, at least not in our lifetimes.  :(

The following article discusses one of the MANY types of fossil fuel industry caused lethal pollution impacting our biosphere 24/7:

Energy| Nov. 01, 2016 01:59PM EST

How Fracking Impacts Water-Stressed Regions


SNIPPET:

Ceres researchers mapped water use in hydraulic fracturing across the U.S., using data from FracFocus.org and the World Resources Institute, and found that 57 percent of hydraulically fractured oil and gas wells between Jan. 1, 2011 and Jan. 1, 2016 were in regions of high water competition.

Our newly released interactive map shows water use by shale play and operator. Check it out:

http://www.ecowatch.com/impact-fracking-water-2074553674.html


I think both of you are missing the point I was trying to make. I agree with both of you that many of the planet's ecosystems and the physical environment are permanently damaged, at least from the perspective of Man, living at the top of the food chain, with His Big Brain suddenly realizing he has been shitting where he eats for far too long.

I was just thinking about what that scientist that Leo interviewed pointed out, that life on earth is not going to end. It just won't be what we've evolved into. Life will once again be slime molds floating around in really warm water.

Once man is gone for good, though, Mother Earth will immediately set about healing herself, and although the state of things will be further down the hill of entropy, the earth will once again find a way to evolve, just in some way we can't imagine.

We are horribly anthropocentric in our viewpoint. Most of us, myself included, are profoundly saddened to think of a world without humans and other higher animals. But the earth will still be here after we're gone, and some many millions of years from now, some other interesting species may walk in our ancient footsteps. At least it makes me feel better to imagine that.



Yes, we are anthropocentric, and horribly so in many ways that have harmed, and continue to harm, the biosphere we depend on. But my understanding of what the Pope was saying, and GO's understanding too, was that the earth isn't going to forgive humans. I am certain he was not referring to other species, as you point to as a form of natural forgiveness (i.e. other species that will survive our demise). The scientist that stated that lower order life (i.e. non-self aware) would always be around despite our horrendously irresponsible behavior, did not appear to be voicing a message of hope, but of warning that we must change our destructive 'business as usual' behavior once and for all.

That was the point of the Pope's saying the earth does not forgive. Why do you think GO and I missed the point?


We are as cognizant as you are of the ability of simpler, more adaptable, non-self aware species to survive our poor stewardship. I do not consider it a responsible, positive or hopeful gesture for homo sapiens to hand down a biosphere suitable for simpler, tougher organisms, considering that we have the knowledge, self-awareness, free will and the responsibility to do be sustainable stewards of our biosphere. We cannot assume that our mistakes are acceptable simply because we have so many human empathy deficit disordered polluting elite that "do what they do".

Or do you think we are an evolutionary dead end and cannot escape our ultimate demise?

I like to think we can recognize our mistakes and correct them, not for our egotistical anthropocentric good, but for our logical anthropocentric reasonable perpetuation of our species, which ultimately involves the preservation and protection of hundreds of thousands of species populating the biosphere which we depend on. Don't you agree that doing the right thing by the biosphere is our responsibility? The Pope does. GO and I agree with him.


Eddie said,
Quote
Well, I think it comes down to whether you want to lay blame on Man for his mistakes. The Pope POV does, and lots of people agree with that. But how in the hell can you really expect our species to have collectively stopped on a dime and reversed our consumption of fossil fuels in such a short time?

Look, my own father rode to town in a wagon pulled by mules when he was a small child. He was a depression era kid whose first car was a model A. He lived only 69 years on this earth, but by the time he passed away in 1989, we were already well on our way to ecological disaster.

Sure, there was a strong environmental movement in the 1970's that, if it had persisted might have made a difference. But it didn't die out because most humans don't care, It was murdered by corporate interests.

I tend to look at it in more philosophical terms, and not view our failures as evidence that most men are deliberately making a decision to serve evil over good. It's not that black and white to me. There are definitely some evil people in leadership rules, who took the short road to wealth, ignoring what they knew to be the right action. I hope those people end up in Catholic Hell, even though I don't really believe in hell in the same way the Pope does.

Are we an evolutionary dead end? It sure looks that way to me. But I hope I'm wrong about that. I don't take any joy in having that POV.

Of course we have been on this destructive trajectory for centuries. My father also was a Depression kid. Your father was a saint compared with my father's views on the environment. He would happily fire the howitzers at or poison anything or anybody that he was ordered to destroy for God and country. He was a loyal officer of the U.S. Army.

Long before your dad and mine, the U.S. government actively terraformed the land we occupy now by sending seed packets for planting various apple and other species of plant life to make the pioneers "self sufficient". The idea was to find out which ones could thrive the most in the different climates people settled in. ALL the seeds were of what now are 'native' species, but were invasive species at that time. All these biosphere modifications destroyed much of the viability of the native plant life and the sustainable life style of the native humans.

This is the history of the USA. The real life character behind Johnny Appleseed was a smart business man that would precede the pioneers by planting apple trees in the frontier lands. The government would give free land to (white European only) settlers if they had X amount of apple trees of at least three years of age. Jonny would "sell" land with three year old apple trees on it to newly arrived settlers so they could get a deed to the land. It is a huge irony that the huge generational wealth from those families is considered a point of Libertarian pride when it was the U.S. Government that subsidized their first efforts. LOL.

When the game switched to industrializing everything with "cheap" energy, including agriculture, there were MANY voices from the scientific community that explained, in detail, how to do all this without trashing the environment. But the irrational exploitive and destructive modus operandi held sway.  It wasn't just a few bad apples that overrode prudent development on behalf of short term gargantuan, empire building profits. We had a choice here and in Europe and in Australia and South America and in China and everywhere else. We made the wrong choices. We knew then and mostly know now what the right choices are.

I can't blame anyone else but homo sapiens for what is continuing to degrade the biosphere. Whether we discard the moral dimensions of that destructive behavior or not, it is still destructive, life killing behavior that is the species level equivalent of suicide. We are supposed to be rational. We are supposed to sapient. Suicide is irrational. Whether we are all just crazy or not, we still bear 100% of the responsibility for catastrophic, sixth extinction level climate change.

As to your belief that we cannot alter our course rapidly enough to prevent our demise, perhaps you are right. 
But like you, I hope not. 
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #688 on: November 09, 2016, 06:28:40 pm »
Climate Today: Good News, Bad News and TBD News

Tom Hughes, Energy Independent Vermont info@energyindependentvt.org
 
November 9, 2016 4:40 PM
 
 Anthony,

First, the bad news.

A climate science denier has been elected president. Donald Trump threatens to move America and the world backward in the fight against a crisis that threatens life as we know it. While this is truly terrifying news, I take solace in the words of Calvin Coolidge:

Quote
“If the spirit of liberty should vanish in other parts of the Union, and support of our institutions should languish, it could all be replenished from the generous store held by the people of this brave little state of Vermont.”

To help replenish your spirits, I hope you’ll join us in ten days at the Climate Solutions Summit on Nov. 19. Register here if you haven't already.

Second, the good news, and there’s a lot of it.

•Vermont IS a brave little state and voters here rejected Donald Trump.

•In addition, Vermont elected incredibly strong pro-climate candidates up and down the ballot. Patrick Leahy and Peter Welch re-join Bernie Sanders to make up the best congressional delegation in America.

•David Zuckerman will make an outstanding pro-climate lieutenant governor.

•Two supporters of carbon pricing won election to the Senate from Chittenden County and a member of the Climate Caucus won in Windsor County.

•Pro-climate candidates for state representative performed extraordinarily well in the face of a massive onslaught of misleading ads paid for by the fossil fuel industry, and that chamber remains loaded with committed, talented legislators ready to fight for clean energy and bold climate action.

Finally, the news that is still to be determined.

Over the course of the campaign, Phil Scott’s position on climate change “evolved” and he professes a vision of an energy independent Vermont. Where we differ is on the roadmap to reach that shared destination. We look forward to working with Governor Scott on ways to clean our air and grow our economy. It was just 10 years ago that a Republican governor put a price on carbon pollution in the electric sector in Vermont. Should Gov. Scott choose, he can continue Vermont’s non-partisan approach to climate change.

It was a mixed bag of an election for environmentalists. But one thing is certain … global warming doesn’t care about political parties. It threatens us all. For that reason, pro-climate Vermonters will continue to push for bold climate action in the years ahead.

Sincerely,

Tom
 
 
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 36274
  • Location: Colchester, Vermont
    • Renwable Revolution
Re: 🚩 Global Climate Chaos ☠️
« Reply #689 on: November 10, 2016, 08:09:00 pm »
Scientists: Trump climate policies will mean "game over" 

Climate change may be escalating so fast it could be 'game over', scientists warn

New research suggests the Earth's climate could be more sensitive to greenhouse gases than thought, raising the spectre of an 'apocalyptic side of bad' temperature rise of more than 7C within a lifetime

The Independent, (UK), Nov. 10, 2016

It is a vision of a future so apocalyptic that it is hard to even imagine.

But, if leading scientists writing in one of the most respected academic journals are right, planet Earth could be on course for global warming of more than seven degrees Celsius within a lifetime.

And that, according to one of the world’s most renowned climatologists, could be “game over” – particularly given the imminent presence of climate change denier Donald Trump in the White House.

Scientists have long tried to work out how the climate will react over the coming decades to the greenhouse gases humans are pumping into the atmosphere.

According to the current best estimate, by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), if humans carry on with a “business as usual” approach using large amounts of fossil fuels, the Earth’s average temperature will rise by between 2.6 and 4.8 degrees above pre-industrial levels by 2100.

However new research by an international team of experts who looked into how the Earth’s climate has reacted over nearly 800,000 years warns this could be a major under-estimate.

Because, they believe, the climate is more sensitive to greenhouse gases when it is warmer.

A reconstruction of the Earth's global mean temperature over the last 784,000 years, on the left of the graph, followed by a projection to 2100 based on new calculations of the climate's sensitivity to greenhouse gases (Friedrich, et al. (2016). In a paper in the journal Science Advances, they said the actual range could be between 4.78C to 7.36C by 2100, based on one set of calculations.

Some have dismissed the idea that the world would continue to burn fossil fuels despite obvious global warming, but emissions are still increasing despite a 1C rise in average thermometer readings since the 1880s.

And US President-elect Donald Trump has said he will rip up America’s commitments to the fight against climate change.

Professor Michael Mann, of Penn State University in the US, who led research that produced the famous “hockey stick” graph showing how humans were dramatically increasing the Earth’s temperature, told The Independent the new paper appeared "sound and the conclusions quite defensible".

“And it does indeed provide support for the notion that a Donald Trump presidency could be game over for the climate,” he wrote in an email.

“By ‘game over for the climate’, I mean game over for stabilizing warming below dangerous (ie greater than 2C) levels.

“If Trump makes good on his promises, and the US pulls out of the Paris [climate] treaty, it is difficult to see a path forward to keeping warming below those levels.”

Greenpeace UK said the new research was further evidence that urgent action was needed.

Dr Doug Parr, the environmental campaign group’s chief scientist, said: “The worrying thing is the suggestion climate sensitivity is higher [than thought] is not incompatible with higher temperatures we have been seeing this year.

“If there is science backing that up, that there’s a higher sensitivity of the climate to greenhouse gases, that puts at risk the prospect of keeping the globe at the Paris target of well below 2C.

Quote
“Anybody who understands the situation we find ourselves in would have already have realised we are in an emergency situation.” 

Dr Tobias Friedrich, one of the authors of the paper, said: “Our results imply that the Earth’s sensitivity to variations in atmospheric carbon dioxide increases as the climate warms.

“Currently, our planet is in a warm phase – an interglacial period – and the associated increased climate sensitivity needs to be taken into account for future projections of warming induced by human activities.

“The only way out is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible.”

Dr Andrey Ganopolski, who was involved in the research and on the IPCC’s latest report, admitted their work was controversial with some scientists disagreeing and others agreeing with their findings.

“In our field of science, you cannot be definite by 100 per cent. There are always uncertainties and we discuss this in the paper,” he said.

“If we have more and more results of this sort, then we have more reasons to be concerned.”

Dr Ganopolski, of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, suggested their findings meant it would be harder to prevent the world entering dangerous global warming of 2C or above.

“Our results mean it is not impossible to stay within 2C but it probably – if we are right and climate sensitivity is higher than this – would require even strong cuts in carbon emissions,” he said.

“Whether it’s feasible politically … I believe it is feasible technically.

“It would be really good to stay below 1.5C or close to that, whether it’s feasible I’m probably a bit sceptical about that.”

Commenting on the paper, Professor Eric Wolff, of Cambridge University, said using data from the past was a “powerful way of understanding the climate”.

But he noted the authors had used different ways of estimating average global temperature, some of which had produced “a lower range of values”. 

“The estimates of temperature in this paper are subject to large uncertainties, and therefore the range of estimates for 2100 is also very wide,” Professor Wolff said.

“Still, it's encouraging that it overlaps with model estimates and confirms that the emission reductions promised in Paris are essential to avoid unacceptable climate changes."

Mark Lynas laid out what would happen as the temperature rises in his award-winning book, Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet.

He was shocked by the researchers’ results.

“It sounds on the apocalyptic side of bad and, in some ways, it is realistic because ‘business as usual’ just got more likely as Trump wants to rebuild the pipelines … the complete ‘fossilisation’ of the US,” he said.

“It was game over at six [degrees] to be honest. I don’t think there was much more to add, other than turning the planet into Venus.”

Nasa recently said Venus may once have been habitable before runaway global warming turned the planet into its current version of hell with temperatures of more than 460C, almost no water and an atmosphere of mainly carbon dioxide with clouds of sulphuric acid.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/climate-change-game-over-global-warming-climate-sensitivity-seven-degrees-a7407881.html
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

 

+-Recent Topics

Future Earth by AGelbert
March 30, 2022, 12:39:42 pm

Key Historical Events ...THAT YOU MAY HAVE NEVER HEARD OF by AGelbert
March 29, 2022, 08:20:56 pm

The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth by AGelbert
March 28, 2022, 01:12:42 pm

Electric Vehicles by AGelbert
March 27, 2022, 02:27:28 pm

Heat Pumps by AGelbert
March 26, 2022, 03:54:43 pm

Defending Wildlife by AGelbert
March 25, 2022, 02:04:23 pm

The Koch Brothers Exposed! by AGelbert
March 25, 2022, 01:26:11 pm

Corruption in Government by AGelbert
March 25, 2022, 12:46:08 pm

Books and Audio Books that may interest you 🧐 by AGelbert
March 24, 2022, 04:28:56 pm

COVID-19 🏴☠️ Pandemic by AGelbert
March 23, 2022, 12:14:36 pm