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Comments 40101 to 40150:

  1. 2013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #49B

    Ah, a conservative group arguing for MORE regulations on the scrappy home-based "business" of selling extra power to the electric company. Perhaps their ideology of smaller government, protecting the "little guy," and the kind of unfettered can-do do-it-yourself self-sufficiency we've heard so much about is finally cracking! Now we just need to aim their newfound love of regulation at a worthy target. How about the fossil fuels industries? We could get them to strengthen regulation of frac-

    A model bill endorsed by the Alec board of directors last August would strip the EPA of power to shut down a frack site or oil industry facility.

    ... oh.

  2. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    John Hartz - this is not a pissing match. Yube has made a number of spurious claims, and I feel it's important to not let these go unchallenged. Yube, however continues to duck the question, and also steers well clear of any discussion of actual science, so this has come to its conclusion.  

    Moderator Response:

    [JH] I am remiss for not pointing out that YubeDude was doing most of the peeing.

  3. Media failure on Iraq War repeated in climate change coverage

    All: The OP was posted at the request of John Cook, the founder and owner of SkS. If you object to its posting, you are free to do so. Temper tantrums will not, however, be tolerated.

  4. Media failure on Iraq War repeated in climate change coverage

    In the US, our advertiser supported media is wildly successful at delivering commericial messages.   The purpose of any news segment is to attract and build more of an audience for advertisers.   They have no obligation to serve the welfare of viewers.

  5. 2013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #49B

    @nigelj: Sadly, most politicans will say and do whatever it takes to remain in power. Consistency is not one of their strong suits. Think: "Jack be nimble, ..." 

  6. Media failure on Iraq War repeated in climate change coverage

    Yube, this is the purpose of the site, to better inform the public. What can be more central than media coverage?

    However, I doubt the media can do better. 1) it is an entertainment source.  2) its a source for soothing, as much or more than informing. 3) There is no solutions offered but only presentation of the problem.

    What we need to develop are valid solutions, then the public will want to hear it. And, then that section of the media will look at the real problem. A certain part of the public needs to be deceived, the media simply provides.

  7. Media failure on Iraq War repeated in climate change coverage

    The science is in.  Now, we need to change public opinion.  As an artist whose anti-war play "Prophecy" was censored in the NY Times, though loved by audiences, my experience with producing a play about Climate Change scientists and their struggle, "Extreme Whether" is similar.  We need stories that tell the truth.  http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/extreme-whether

  8. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Rob Painiting & Yube Dude: Your discourse has degenerated into a rather absurd peeing match. Pleaese cease and desist.

  9. Experts say the IPCC underestimated future sea level rise

    Tom,

    I looked  at the sea level rise map you linked here.  I looked at Miami since I live in Florida.  Your map showed little damage in Miami at a 3 meter sea level rise even though I know that the land side of Miami is only one meter high and the entire area should be inunduated. I found this map from Climate Central (which only shows the USA).  It shows that Miami is only a handful of islands after 3 meters of sea level rise.  I found this UNEP report which shows a lot of Bangladesh (15 millon people's houses) underwater after 1 meter of sea level rise while your link shows only a few dots of water.  Substantial parts of Bangladesh will be gone with even 1 meter of sea level rise, much less 4 meters.  Reading the background on your link it says the elevation is from satalite data and shows the tops of the trees and buildings.  This does not seem very useful to me.

    It is my experience that these maps underestimate the damage of sea level rise.  They show inundated area, but  I cannot live in a house that is 10 cm above sea level.  Any surge would flood the house.  For this reason .25 meters of sea level rise appears to have no damage, because a minimum of .25 meters is required everywhere to avoid floods.   If sea level rises .25 meters the people who live .5 meters above sea level will have to move because they will flood with any storm surge.  Usually people move after disasters like hurricanes.  This is affecting Miami now as low lying areas flood from high tides they used to be resistant to. In addition, areas like Miami are cut off from the mainland and will become useless islands with no fresh water before they are inundated.

    The deltas of the world have a greatly disproportionate amount of the good farming land.  If the Nile delta (covered in the UNEP link above) is flooded, the farmers cannot simply move into the desert and expect to be able to raise crops like they formerly did.  Virtually all the deltas are low-lying.

    Sea level rise will not wipe out civilization, but even 1 meter of rise will displace millions of people worldwide, and the food source for many more.  This will not happen tomorrow, but it is an important problem.

  10. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Rob@47 

    Remember the topic is the Cameron project that is being shown on Showtime. The moral issue may be a part of his project but it hardly falls into the cited and sourced catagory. 

    Now, not to put too fine a point on it, what the hell question did you ask that is relevant to the SCIENCE scince of AGW as it pertains to the SKS guidelines? Or was this just your moral outrage demanding a response? Did you get a chance to look at some of those faith based web sites?

    Regardless of what you think or what your opinion is regarding the prognostications, or my own for that matter, it is irrelevant. The post is about a Showtime production. It will be in English. Now it's wonderful you live in New Zealand, I use to live in Gisborne. It is mind boggling that you all know how to illegally obtain a signal and get first rate American productions for free (if that is what you are inferring) but I hate to be the one who has to break this shocking new to you…New Zealand, the entire Polynesian Pacific, and you can even throw in all of North America and Australia hardly constitutes the great bulk of humanity which as you clearly stated is Cameron’s audience.

    So continue on your excess of repetition beating a horse that died many post ago.
    You questions and high minded attitude are yours and yours alone; why the mods have not suggested you cool your distinctly unscientific rants is a mystery to me.

    Morals, emotions, and glossy productions really don’t have any peer review; I have been told that is pretty much sacrosanct here at SKS. Maybe you have heard otherwise.

    Moderator Response:

    [JH] Your rehetoric is overheated. Please dial it back. If you do not, your future posts will be summarily deleted.

    PS - SkS Comments Policy prohibits the use of all caps. Please read the SkS Comments Policy and adhere to it.

  11. Experts say the IPCC underestimated future sea level rise

    Tom @14,

    I've played with such maps and that hasn't comforted me. Again, for the coming century you may well be right, as also suggested in this paper by Nicholls et al (2010):
    http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/369/1934/161.full

    They estimate up to 187 million people forced to relocate during this century in the worst-case (2.4% of the current global population). They also speak about adaptation 'pessimists' and 'optimists':
    "The ‘pessimists’ seem to take it as read that adaptation will either fail or people will not even try to adapt. In contrast, the ‘optimists’ appear overly confident that benefit–cost approaches describe human behaviour in response to threats such as sea-level rise."

    Beyond 2100 it seems less clear to me that adaptation will be the preferred option, or even technically or economically possible, if SLR by that time is so fast that cities/countries will need to adapt almost continuously (and not only to SLR of course). Miami/Florida for example seems almost impossible to defend, even in this century, due to its porous geological foundation:
    http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/06/23/2199031/scientist-miami-as-we-know-it-today-is-doomed-its-not-a-question-of-if-its-a-question-of-when/

    Meanwhile probably some cities/countries will adapt in time to prevent big disasters from happening, but others will likely be too late, so disasters wil probably be bigger and more frequent.

    Also protection costs will rise disproportionately with higher sea level, according to Nicholls et al:
    "[A] dike required in response to a 2m rise in sea level is assumed to be four times the cost of that required for a 1m rise in sea level."

    Since we can't simply assume the world will become richer and richer, due to both climate change and resource depletion, these rising adaptation costs will at some point become an unbearable burden on public budgets. The less we invest in mitigation the sooner we will probably reach this point.

    But at the same time: the less we invest in adaptation, the more and bigger disasters will happen. So we need to invest more now, in both mitigation and adaptation, to prevent costs from becoming unbearable further into the future.

    In Holland, where I live, planners now assume a worst-case of 60 cm in 2100 and 120 cm in 2200, based on IPCC 2007. They know it could be worse, but at this point we don't insure ourselves against that risk. The Dutch Delta Committee considers 130 cm by 2100 and 4 m by 2200 as the worst-case (including subsidence). They think we could adapt to such rises.

    Our Environmental Assessment Agency and Delft University think we can adapt to 1.5 meter/century for at least four centuries. They consider this as a worst-case, even though the main adviser to the Delta Committee say there's a significant risk of more than 1.5 meter/century.

    So, returning to the question, is SLR by itself a civilizational threat? Maybe not, but perhaps I'm more of a pessimist than you are. I agree that other threats may be bigger, certainly during this century. But like I said, SLR adds to these other risks, and may be very significant in itself in coming centuries.

    Also, the world is much fuller now than during the Black Death, and we have nuclear weapons now, which is a big civilizational threat in itself. Still, you may be right that civilization is more resilient than I fear, and that even billions of deaths will not hurt civilization much, unless maybe caused by nuclear war. We should minimize such risks, however, so including the risk of SLR, in my mind.

  12. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Yube - you simply continue to demonstrate you have no rational argument to make. Your lame attempts to wriggle out of this by accusing me of creating strawman arguments is fooling no one. This isn't Jabberwocky you know. You have not answered the question I posed to you several times already because I suspect you know you're probably wrong. Remember upthread that you were the one to raise this issue.

    The assumptions are either that:

    a) the public understand the dire consequences of climate change and ocean acidification under business-as-usual scenarios - which would suggest a lack of morality by continuing down this path, or.... 

    b) the public don't understand and are therefore largely ignorant of the looming ecological and humanitarian crises that lay ahead. 

    I suspect option b, but there is no scientific research that I am aware of to substantiate this. Therefore, as any rational person would surmise, my comments in this thread have been entirely consistent.

    "Regarding the suggestion that my comments smack of racism...I live in the third world and here I am in the minority."

    Maybe you do. As far as I'm aware you're just an anonymous person on the internet, but regardless, this doesn't give you any right to make bigoted comments.

    "They don't get Showtime. If you followed the links you would know where the cable is available and how much it cost."

    Well I don't know about where you live, but down here in the South Pacific a lot of cable TV material is watched even though people don't have cable. I think you might be able to figure out how this is so. You do seem to have a rather naive understanding of the world.    

    "most of whom it should be noted are too poor, too disconnected, and too interested in eating to really give a shit about what you or Mr. Cameron have to say."

    Unlike you I have actually listened to Tuvaluans speak about climate change. They may be poor, but they do give a shit about climate change. I didn't have the heart to tell them that sea level rise could not be stopped and that their homeland will become inundated later this century, or early in the 22nd century. But at some point someone is going to have to spell it out to them.

    "As for the morality or other side issues you keep trying to draw into this thread none of them have any merit on a site dedicated to the science of climate change...maybe a faith based web site is what you should be looking for."

    I'm sure when you are running your own website you will be able to exercise complete editorial control. 

    "Feel free to tie up your high horse in the stable along with the other emotive moral imperatives that have no scientific foundation."

    Climate change and ocean acidification have consequences. Increased heat wave intensity and frequency, for instance, kills people. You can pretend that it doesn't, but it does. There can hardly be a stronger scientific foundation than the many scores of peer-reviewed scientific papers published on this subject. Maybe you have not read any of them. It would seem so. 

  13. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Rob@44

    Well thanks for showing us what a real strawman looks like.

    Is it really your contention that the great bulk of humanity truly understand the ramifications of climate change and ocean acidification, but just don't give a damn?

    The only thing I have said in relationship to your anecdotal great bulk of humanity repetition is that nothing Cameron says will they ever hear. They don't get Showtime. If you followed the links you would know where the cable is available and how much it cost. The cost alone puts it out of reach to your great bulk; most of whom it should be noted are too poor, too disconnected, and too interested in eating to really give a shit about what you or Mr. Cameron have to say.

    As for the morality or other side issues you keep trying to draw into this thread none of them have any merit on a site dedicated to the science of climate change...maybe a faith based web site is what you should be looking for.

    Regarding the suggestion that my comments smack of racism...I live in the third world and here I am in the minority. It is in the third world where most of the impacts are going to be felt especially in regards to sea level rise. The unwashed masses is offered as an alternative to your repeated use of the equally evocative great bulk of humanity. But please, don’t let me slow down you cause or suggest that on SKS science is the discourse of choice; let the pejoratives and accusations fly.

    Feel free to tie up your high horse in the stable along with the other emotive moral imperatives that have no scientific foundation.

    Moving on... 

  14. 2013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #49B

    "An alliance of corporations and conservative activists is mobilising to penalise homeowners who install their own solar panels – casting them as "freeriders" – in a sweeping new offensive against renewable energy, the Guardian has learned."

    I thought conservatives and business groups promoted personal freedom and new products. What a group of dishonest, bullying, hypocrites. 

  15. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    "......and little of anything Cameron says in this film is going to affect the great bulk that you anecdotally referenced. This is for a western market and not the unwashed masses living on Asian flood planes or those low lying islands scattered about the South Pacific."

    Maybe, but now you're venturing into prognostication. And I'm not sure why refer to people from Asia and Polynesia in such a derogatory fashion, it smacks of bigotry. Having been to several South Pacific islands, and living in New Zealand with it's huge polynesian population, I can assure you that many people in the South Pacific watch American television.   

  16. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Yube - I think any rational reader of this thread can clearly see whom is being disingenuous. This video has clearly triggered an emotional response in you and you seem committed to making a nonsensical argument. Is it really your contention that the great bulk of humanity truly understand the ramifications of climate change and ocean acidification, but just don't give a damn? That would be very sad, but I'd like to see some evidence to support it.

  17. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Rob @41

    Now you are just being disingenuous. You did say that the great bulk of humanity was Cameron’s target audience and that they are unaware (Rob @12) of the enormous threat.
    There is no straw man on my part and suggest that there is sophistry. The links??
    Something I am going to learn about cable access by clinking on the Weintraub wiki link? Even the Showtime link doesn’t illuminate a potential for widespread distribution to the great bulk as you suggest.
    My point is consistent. None of this has anything to do with the core position of SKS, and little of anything Cameron says in this film is going to affect the great bulk that you anecdotally referenced. This is for a western market and not the unwashed masses living on Asian flood planes or those low lying islands scattered about the South Pacific.
    (-snip-).

    Moderator Response:

    [DB] Moderation complaints snipped.

  18. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Climate Lurker - AFAIK only SkS moderators can edit their posts. 

  19. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Yube - Hmm...you seem to be arguing a strawman - note the hyperlinks provided in the blog post. As for anecdotal evidence, until such time as someone conducts the research in that regard, that's all there is. I seriously doubt the greater proportion of humanity are so immoral that they would continue business-as-usual armed with the knowledge of all the harm and suffering that it entails. I could be wrong though. Until proven wrong by the relevant research I'll operate under the assumption that the public don't truly understand the ramifications of climate change and ocean acidification.   

  20. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    This is a good thread for this forum because it introduces factors other than technical, which otherwise dominates most threads.

    What we are seeing and feeling (in the world around us) is the rapid rise of a "paradigm shift"  in how we so-called individual personages should/will/must relate to the Earth.  Some will learn through hard experience: others may be angry at the depridations to "The Earth" perpetrated by us all:  some may become "enlightened" by other ways of which we can only speculate.

    Eventually,every person will become a rabid environmentalist:  hopefully in time to effectively respond to "what is required."

    This site is a wonderful resource, and more than once I've said to a recalcitrant nay-sayer..

    "Since you don't believe ME, take your arguments to "Skeptical Science", and see how your ideas hold up..."

    ===============

    Anyway, there is at least a vision for how we (life on the planet) can mitigate this situation, located at

    "www.EarthThrive.net".

    I need to learn how to finish the website, but the "story" part is ther, but not the support documentation.  It's "benign global engineering" , and totally do-able.

    I'd like to put it up here for comments, but.. don't know how.

    It does address the ocean acidification within 50 years, I estimate.

    Regards.

    Moderator Response:

    [DB] Hotlinked URL; extraneous line spaces deleted.

  21. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Rob@24

    it's an anecdotal observation

    Based on what? Is this your observation?
    How can an English language program broadcast on a subscription cable network reach the audience you are suggesting? And did you not suggest that it is this audience that Cameron is trying to reach?

    I have come to expect sources and citations not hyperbole and anecdote; maybe that is the reason for my confusion over the tone and subject of the op

    .

  22. Media failure on Iraq War repeated in climate change coverage

    I have no idea what has happened here...

    First we went non-science AGW issues, now we have left AGW completely...

    Should  we expect sports chat soon?

    Moderator Response:

    [JH] Put a lid on it!

  23. Experts say the IPCC underestimated future sea level rise

    I would have said that disruption to the hydrological cycle is by far the biggest threat posed by climate change. The implications of Dai 2010 are scary but dont seem grab attention the way sealevel rise does.

  24. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Sometimes I see people edit their comments after they've posted them, and was wondering how to do that?  I see in my ocean acidification comment that I did actually make a remark that sounded like I think anoxia is likely, when what I actually meant to say is that if the layers stop mixing completely, then it seems likely that it would happen.  To me it seems really unlikely that mixing will completely stop any time soon.

    Moderator Response:

    [TD] Moderators can edit anyone's comments, including their own.  We try to refrain from editing our own, but speaking for myself, if I notice I made a typo and my comment has not been up long enough for many people to see it, sometimes I succumb to temptation and fix it.

  25. Experts say the IPCC underestimated future sea level rise

    lennartvdl @13, I highly recommend that you spend some time playing with a sea level rise mapper such as the one at flood.firetreen.net  If you do, you will notice several things.

    1)  Even with 60 meters of sea level rise, only a very small fraction of the Earth's land surface is flooded.  Bear in mind that the map simply shades all land under a given elevation, so that it shows extensive flooding north of the Caspian sea in Russia and Khazakstan where sea level is a function of rainfall and irrigation in the area rather than the melting of ice caps, and hence will never show flooding to that extent.  Indeed, the Caspian Sea is likely to show a decline in sea level as the area becomes more arid.

    Because only a small fraction of the Earth's land area is affected, even by such large sea level rises, sea level rise is a major problem almost exclusively for some low lying coastal areas (Bangladesh, Florida, Denmark) and for small island states whose islands are coral atolls rather than volcanic.

    2)  Even for those areas which have a major problem, they represent just a small portion of the Earth's population (2.2% for Bangladesh, probably around 5% altogether).  So, even if the problem areas need to be abandoned entirely, while that will cause significant short term suffering, within a generation they will be just as other residents in the land to which they emigrate and the problem will cease as a distinct problem.  Of course, the sea level rise is likely to be slow meaning the problems arising from emigration will continue in the long term, but be far smaller and easier to cope with at any given time.

    3)  If you look at a 4 meter map, you will sea that even at 4 meters - double the highest one century estimate shown above for BAU, and nearly four times the median estimate - Dahka remains unflooded, as does the majority of Bangladesh.  Sea level rise at any reasonable estimate, therefore, is not a threat that will destroy even Bangladesh in a century; although it will increase harm in Bangladesh from riverine flooding and cyclones. 

    4)  Moving on from the map, Dutch land reclamation from the sea began in the thirteenth century.  That makes it clear that protecting land from the sea does not need massive, modern technology and nor need it be beyond the means of even the relatively poor.  Indeed, all else being equal, deltas will naturally be reclaimed from the effects of sea level rise by the deposition of additional sediment from the rivers that formed them.  All else is not equal, of course, and changes in flow patterns in the hramaputra and Ganges rivers due to glacial melt, and potential greater aridity may be more of a threat to Bangladesh than sea level rise.  But that Bangladesh will lose land to sea level rise is not a foregone conclusion by any means, and significant efforts to prevent that can be achieved just by local labour.  The same can be said of most other delta areas.  (Some, however, have porous soils that prevent protection of the land by sea walls so not all land can be saved.  I believe Florida to be in this situation, but don't quote me on that.)

    5)  For those areas where land has a moderate slope from the shoreline, sea level rise will involved moving a part of their infrastructure back from the sea on a periodic basis, but a a slow rate relative to the pace of infrastructure construction in many parts of the world.  It represents an additional cost, but not a large additional cost relative to normal production.

    All of this is not to say that sea level rise will not have costs (it will); or to say that it will not cause significant suffering for some people (it will).  It will not, however, cause the sorts of costs and suffering that are likely to bring a civilization to its knees.  Its costs will be far less, in relative terms, than those of WWII or the cold war; and massively less in proportion to disasters that have previously struck our civilization such as the Black Death.  As a threat to our civilization, sea level rise ranks significantly behind overfishing, and well behind some of the other potential, but not certain consequences of global warming including ocean acidification, ocean annoxia, and reduced food yield.

  26. How do meteorologists fit into the 97% global warming consensus?

    @Michael Sweet and Poster: It's time that the two of you cease and desist the Punch & Judy show.

  27. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Thanks for the aerosol info Rob...very useful.  FWIW, got another climate article published today in Huffington Post:  www.huffingtonpost.com/davidgoldstein/the-insanity-of-climate-c_b_4393750.html?utm_hp_ref=climate-change    More psychologically than 'sciencey' oriented.

  28. How do meteorologists fit into the 97% global warming consensus?

    Michael Sweet will you please read what I wrote not what you think I wrote.  I clearly stated that I am referring to the piece pointed to by John Hartz.  I am not referring to anything or anyone else at all.  My claim is not as you seem to believe "that no meteorologists are deniers..." but that this is not stated in the piece I read.  No more than that.

  29. How do meteorologists fit into the 97% global warming consensus?

    Poster,

    The key thing is that, as Tom Dayton's list proves, is that your statement:

    " I note that nowhere in that piece (as far as I could see) does it say that some meteorologists deny global warming. What it does say is that some meteorologists are not convinced of human input into global warming, which isn't quite the same thing:

    which I read to claim that there are no meterologists that deny global warming, is incorrect.  As I pointed out, meterologists who deny global warming are so common that it is unnecessary for John Hartz to provide examples.  

    As I asked before: I find your apparent claim that no meteorologists are deniers strange.  What is your point?  

  30. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    This Scripps Institute FAQ is useful in putting the oxygen question in perspective, which shows a loss of ~ 0.03% between 1992 and 2009, hardly something worth staying up at night over.

    scrippso2.ucsd.edu/faq

    (I'm not saying I think a massive anoxia event is about to happen, just so that's clear, though I'm no expert...)  The whole ocean acidification thing does worry me though.

  31. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Climate Lurker - I'll stick to what the research implies. Public claims of ocean anoxia are generally exaggerated. Yes, it is very much a problem for apex predators in the ocean because their musculature demands a great deal of oxygen, and well-oxygenated waters in the upper ocean are declining. See Stramma (2012) in Nature Climate Change. It's a long way from that to large-scale ocean anoxia though.

    I don't want to give readers the impression that our atmosphere will run out of oxygen because of human activity either - which I've seen suggested elsewhere. The de-oxygenation of the oceans is a problem though, and could favor jellyfish which are less dependent on well-oxygenated surface waters. 

  32. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Dagold #28. Good on you for commenting in the media on the research debunking the pause. I agree scientific comment in the newspaper media is often lacking in nuance. Frankly it can be at a poor standard although clearly your article is very good. I would like to see more climate scientists commenting directly in the daily media as guests, and combating the key sceptical arguments. This would get some respect.

    Of course the media sometimes dont want to dig too deep and have their biases. They like things to remain controversial to create an ongoing story, and digging into the pause may be seen as ending the controversy on recent temperature records. One can only hope they put important science first and the future of humanity first, and comment more on this pause in terms of the generating factors and research suggesting its minimal.

    Certainly the pause is minimal and is likely to end quite soon as the el nino / la nina cycle changes, but sceptics have used uncertainty and deliberately clouded the issue, to delay doing anything. Which I find very frustrating.

  33. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Hansen's Faustian Bargain still holds. Industrial sulfate pollution generally stays in the lower atmosphere where clouds form. They serve as 'seed' particles around which water vapor can condense to form clouds. Therefore they either settle out, or get rained out of the atmosphere rather quickly. The Faustian Bargain remains only because industrial sulfate pollution continues to be pumped out around the clock. If it were to ever stop, 'payment' would become due within several weeks, not years.

    Strong volcanic eruptions are different, the strong uplift from violent eruptions in the tropics get entrained into the upper atmosphere (above the level at which clouds typically form). The strong uplift near the equator as part of the large-scale atmospheric circulation, combined with the general absence of cloud formation, ensures that volcanic sulfate emissions can remain aloft in the upper atmosphere for up to several years in the case of large tropical eruptions. There has been some research which suggests intense industrial sulfate pollution from China is able to reach the upper atmosphere, but this is somewhat contentious. 

    I would also point out that some researchers have identified moderate tropical volcanic eruptions as a reason for less sunlight reaching the Earth's surface over the last decade or so (global dimming). The ocean circulation plays a part, but you can see in the Hiroshima widget (top right-hand corner of this page), that the heating rate declined after 2004. How much of that is due to dimming, and how much due to the ocean circulation, is an open question.    

  34. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Rob Painting, I have to agree regarding acidification.  It should not be ignored in any story about carbon, since it is the twin sister to warming (or maybe it's the left half of the body and warming is the right), and because oceans are the Earth's main source of oxygen.

    What will happen if mixing stops, and what is the likelihood?  Will it result in anoxia (seems likely)?  How did time play into previous anoxia events?  What was the relationship between ∆ pH, ∆ temp, ∆ ocean circulation, ∆ time and anoxia?  Seems like a complicated relationship.  If there is a time aspect aka organisms have time to adapt so anoxia is avoided, does our unprecedented rate of acidification mean too little time for adaptation?  I understand oxygen levels have been decreasing in the atmosphere, but think it is mostly due to the combustion reaction between CO2 and O2, yes?  Is there any portion attributed to less oxygen formation in the oceans?  I think the answer here is also yes.  Yale Environment 360 Story

    What tips the scale for ocean organisms that would cause a full scale anoxia event?  Since I don't hear much about this, I assume it's because the scientists who study it aren't concerned about it?  Maybe this is a whole separate Hollywood blockbuster...

  35. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Rob.   Hmmm...yes, I hear you about OA.  It's just so challenging to present effectively in the visual media of mainstream cinema.  Something for me to think about.     As far as the industrial sulfates....the one week life span does not change the basic dynamic of temporary cooling that Hansen called the 'Faustian Bargain'...is this correct?  Also, I have read that volcanic aerosoles remain effectively airborn (as far as the cooling mechanism) for 1 to 2 years a la 'The Pinatubo or Mt. Tambora Effects'...is this correct?

  36. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    David Goldstein - sorry to be a pedant, but the atmospheric lifetime of industrial sulfate pollution is typically just over a week, not years. Nice bit of writing though.

    As for your movie script, ignoring ocean acidification is a glaring omission. It could well be the most devastating consequence of fossil fuel emissions. Ocean acidification appears to have extinguished ancient marine life (based on the preferential extinction of marine calcifiers) in some of the major extinction events in deep time. Those rates of ancient ocean acidification were probably far slower than the rate of ocean acidification occurring today. Indeed, the current rate of ocean acidification is unprecedented within the last 300 million years.

    It's like jumping off a tall building, marine biologists suspect the outcome is going to be very, very bad, but it's extremely difficult to quantify. Even some species that appear resistant to ocean acidification (some crab species for instance), don't come off that well when one considers that their main food source is highly vulnerable.   

  37. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    "Regarding the alleged pause, I disagree a little. This is rather a big meme. I listen to ordinary people in the street discussing clmate change, especially the sceptical ones, and this is the big thing they quote"

    Yes, for now. My point was that this meme will fade. It will disappear entirely when the wind-driven ocean circulation switches phase and global surface warming rises abruptly. Of course the climate science cranks will simply move on to another meme. But I'm interested in the bigger picture, not the crank shifting of goalposts.

    As for future changes in El Nino/La Nina, that's an area of great uncertainty. There are a number of research papers that claim various things. No clear picture has yet emerged. What I have observed is El Nino tends to be stronger when the circulation is sluggish (positive Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation [IPO]), and La Nina stronger when the circulation is vigorous (negative IPO).    

  38. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    nigel- you comment that "the research suggesting the pause is minimal needs wider publicity".  I, of course, agree.  I actually wrote an article about the 'pause' several months ago for Huffington Post:  www.huffingtonpost.com/davidgoldstein/the-first-level-of-disrup_b_2975223.html       The problem is, as I see it, that even this relatively simple level of nuance and iteration is simply too much for the level of discourse these days in the media and the public-at-large.  Another factor, of course, is the question of what proportion of the media even WANTS wants to dig too deeply into the nuances of climate change. 

    Moderator Response:

    [JH] The use of "all caps" is prohibited by the SkS Comments Policy.

  39. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Rob Painting at 2. I certainly agree we are causing climate change, and climate change is causing suffering, and will cause considerably more. This does need discussion, its just a question of treading carefully.

    At the very least descriptions of human suffering must be totally accurate. My concern is the climate sceptic denial people jumping on any errors or waving their arms about scaremongering.

    Regarding the alleged pause, I disagree a little. This is rather a big meme. I listen to ordinary people in the street discussing clmate change, especially the sceptical ones, and this is the big thing they quote. Of course they dont undertsand the reasons that its just the solar cycle and la nina having a temporary affect on surface temperatures, and that the oceans continue to warm strongly.

    It would be good to see this issue adressed better in the newspapers and the research suggesting the pause is minimal needs wider publicity. This site does a good job on this particular issue and needs wider publicity. I look foward to your next upcoming article on the issue.

    I think global warming is probably changing the el nino / la nina cycle. This cycle isnt fully understood, but currents relate to differential temperatures affecting this and unevenly around the world. It may lead to bigger el ninos but fewer of them.

  40. How do meteorologists fit into the 97% global warming consensus?

    Michael Sweet my point was made based on  the information provided by John Hartz.  It was not a response to comments that are pure conjecure such as "Any Fox meteorologist is also most likely a denier. They were probably not listed in the posts you read since they are so common the writer thought it unnecessary to give examples."

    Similarly Tom Dasyton,  John Hartz didn 't provide a list of "denier meteorologists"  Had he done so my comment would not have been appropriate and would not have been made.

  41. Media failure on Iraq War repeated in climate change coverage

    The Iraq War Resolution was presented to Congress in Sept 2002, a year after the tragedy of 911.  The Resolution passed in Oct 2002.  In Nov 2002, there was a General election, during which the Presidents Party gained two seats in the Senate and 8 in the House, handing them control of both Legislative bodies.

    People play politics in DC all the time in scheduling votes for major actions, but a War Vote is different.  Thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands, of lives hang in the balance.  If ever 'conscience' was needed to rule a Congressman's actions, this qualified.  But a year away from the horror of 911?  Scheduling a War Vote a month before an election ensured that Congressmen would NOT be voting their conscience but rather in consideration of the revenge-lust of their constituents.  Who can 'lead' with conscience in a War Vote when the Mob has been handed a hammer a month away?  In the House, 95% of the NAY votes for war came from Democrats, and in the Senate it was 91%.  And the Party clearly paid greatly a month later for those votes of conscience.

    200,000+ people, including 4,000+ American soldiers, died, in part, as an Afterthought to a War Vote scheduled primarily over its political consequences.  And the American media had Nothing to say about this.  It has always seemed to a particular kind of crime to have done this to our soldiers, and the Iraqi people, and for the media to treat it with no light whatsoever.  They are complicit in a crime.

  42. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Rob- yes, OA feels like it might be a 'Horseman of the Apocolypse' that is being largely (in terms of the general public) overlooked compared to his more 'glamorous' colleagues.  

  43. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Nigelj - "I do agree human stories of climate impacts are a great idea, however I dont think you want examples of specific human suffering creeping into this websites articles on the science, as you will make yourself targets for accusations of scaremongering."

    As I wrote earlier, climate change has and will continue to cause suffering. To ignore this simply because climate science cranks make spurious allegations is weak justification in my book. Burning fossil fuels = suffering. Those are the cards that physics has dealt us. Doing something about it is a moral challenge.

    "In terms of reaching the public the research debunking the pause is criticical."

    I think you underestimate the temporary nature of these memes. They are soon forgotten and new ones evolve over time. This meme doesn't really have any legs because the Earth as a whole continues to warm - especially the oceans. Ongoing global sea level rise is a testament to this.

    SkS also has a series coming up on the wind-driven ocean circulation explaining the fundamentals of the so-called 'hiatus' and 'accelerated warming' decades. Finishing the animations and graphics are the hold-up at the moment. 

  44. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Yube - it's an anecdotal observation. I am unaware of any public survey which delves into the level of understanding of its respondents sufficiently to gauge whether they truly understand the ramifications. When I talk to people (non-experts) I've yet to run across a single person whom has even heard of ocean acidification. And yet, on our current trajectory, an extinction event later this century appears likely as a result of ocean acidification and ocean warming.

    Coral reefs are already headed toward functional extinction, and a looming change in the wind-driven ocean circulation (greater warming in the tropical oceans) will see massive coral reef mortality in the coming years. Too late to stop that sadly, but it is likely to further galvanise climate policy activism.

    Boswarm - I have no idea what you mean about coming back to bite us. The scientific basis for climate policy action is overwhelming. SkS writes about the science relentlessly, and will continue to do so. But the more people that understand the moral implications of climate change and ocean acidification the better. If Jim Cameron's mini series, and the use of movie celebrities, helps to penetrate public indifference or apathy, even better still. Hopefully he avoids further scientific mistakes, such as those I pointed out in the trailer.

  45. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    @Jeremy(#9) - yes, Jeremy, I do address the denialist campaign (which in my screnplay has gone strong thru 2070).  I am fairly well informed (for a 'lay person') around climate issues.  It has been fun AND challenging to think about what to include and/or not include in a 2 hour 'blockbuster' type movie about a 4C warmer world.  For example, I have NOT mentioned ocean acidification because I am trying to be conscious of what the average (re: at best, superficially informed) citizen-movie goer can take in.  For instance, I include a scene straight from a headline story in my local (Eugene, Oregon) paper last month about coastal fishermen hauling in nets full of writhing jellyfish and baby octopi climbing onto their fishing lines in an attempt to escape an oceanic 'dead zone' - but do not mention OA specifically.  BTW, email me at dagold56@hotmail.com, be glad to send a copy for a read and some feedback!

  46. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    I have a design background but also some science, and I take an interest in climate change. I do agree human stories of climate impacts are a great idea, however I dont think you want examples of specific human suffering creeping into this websites articles on the science, as you will make yourself targets for accusations of scaremongering.

    If there must be articles like this on this website, they need to be separate articles clearly stating that they are dealing with the human side of climate change. Articles in newspapers would be good but they must be highly accurate or they will get ripped apart.

    For example look what happened to Al Gore. Al Gores book was very good on the science but it also made some open ended disaster speculation on sea level rise that went beyond the IPCC predictions, and he made himself a target for accusations of scaremongering. One relatively little thing in his book weakened it somewhat.

    In terms of reaching the public the research debunking the pause is criticical. Assuming this is strong research it needs much wider exposure in the mainstream daily media. This in combination with a human interest and suffereing angle would be quite compelling.

  47. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    Although welcome, I doubt that a movie is going to move sufficient number of people to make a difference. It’s all about marketing – people need to hear the message 10-15 times before they sit up and take notice. And by message I don’t mean blogs, or arcane science papers that help contribute to our knowledge but are almost totally meaningless to the general public. By message I mean extreme weather events: extended droughts, massive storm surges, typhoons, extreme heat waves, etc. Even though the deniers attempt to downplay the relevance of climate change to these events, my sense is that most people recognise these events as being unusual, and climate change offers an explanation. But how many Florida residents can see the writing on the wall regarding loss of potable water because of just modest sea level rise? How many people in the south western USA think that somehow they will continue to have drinking water despite the continued reduction in Colorado river water flows? Just two examples of the many that abound in the world regarding the effects of climate change.

    I recently attended Green Party meeting where I live (BC, Canada), and a well-known climate scientist commented that I was a pessimist because I didn’t see any significant action happening in time to mitigate climate change (although he did subsequently comment that perhaps I was being a realist). The question is one of balance – how to convince the public not just that climate change is real (it appears most people now get that!) but to convince them that the consequences are going to be very severe unless something is done about it, and done soon, yet at the same time not have them give up hope. People need to be mobilized so that governments worldwide are forced to take strong action to reduce CO2 emissions. That is the real problem facing us. Living in Canada, with both federal and provincial governments hell bent on extracting fossil fuels as fast as they can, and a population that appear to be resigned to the status quo, hanging onto hope is tough!

  48. Experts say the IPCC underestimated future sea level rise

    Tom @12,

    I doubt you're right there. How are countries going to adapt to SLR of say 2-4 meters/century after 2100 (assuming they've managed to adapt until then)? The rich countries may succeed in adaptation for a while, but in the poor countries mass migration seems a more likely result, which would probably have strong effects in the rich countries as well (assuming there will still be rich and poor countries by then). It will be very costly to keep adapting to rapidly and continually changing shorelines, and retreat may be the only option at a certain point. Only if you assume the world will get richer and richer over the coming centuries, can I imagine such SLR would not be a major problem. But I don't think we can assume that, because there seem to be strong limits to such growth.

  49. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    John @ 18 

    Well surely you will allow me to ask for Rob to link a source for his "great bulk of humanity is unaware" comment. 

    (-snip-)

    Moderator Response:

    [RH] Moderation complaints snipped.

  50. Climate Change: Years of Living Dangerously

    wpsokeland: Your comment was deleted because it was sloganeering in the form of gobblygook. Sloganeering is prohibited by the SkS Coments Policy. Please read this policy and adhere to it.

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