Why has the surface of the Arctic sea ice remained frozen this March?
Yesterday morning, March 30, I emailed James Overland with the Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory/NOAA in Seattle asking him about the slow melt of visible Arctic sea ice, adding that this was certain to stoke the fires of the army of climate skeptics. This morning Dr. Overland replied that “the winds on the Atlantic side were [...]
Solar Minimum Induced Global Cooling? Don’t Bet On It
Will the media continue to ignore all the extreme weather that scientists have been predicting for years would become more common as we pour more heat trapping gases into the atmosphere? Given that we’ve only warmed about a degree Fahrenheit in the past half century and much of this country projected to warm 9°F or more on our current emissions path, it’s hard to imagine the kind of extreme weather we will ultimately be seen.
Corporate Influence on Climate Change and Environmental NGO’s Exposed
By pretending the broken system can work–and will work, in just a moment, after just one more Democratic win, or another, or another–the big green groups are preventing the appropriate response from concerned citizens, which is fury at the system itself. They are offering placebos to calm us down when they should be conducting and amplifying our anger at this betrayal of our safety by our politicians. The US climate bills are long-term plans: they lock us into a woefully inadequate schedule of carbon cuts all the way to 2050. So when green groups cheer them on, they are giving their approval to a path to destruction–and calling it progress.
Disturbing New Information on the Arctic Methane Bubbling to the Surface
In the past two days, there has been many breaking news stories published on “a large but overlooked source of methane gas escaping from permafrost underwater”. Here is one report from the National Science Foundation and a commentary by by Will Steffen at World Changing.com From the NSF, March 4. (Click title for full story): [...]
Bill Gates Sees Climate Change as Important Global Problem
Here are two opposing articles on the Bill Gates TED Talk on “Innovating to Zero.” Our opinion, if Gates thinks climate change is important, we should all feel a little more hopeful. His take on this issue may not be all we could wish for, but as he learns more about how very serious is the global treat we face and how extraordinarily complex an adequate solution must necessarily be, he may stop thinking in terms of simplistic formulas and quick technological fixes. He’ll see that like with climatic systems, many positive feedback loops are inherent in the development of economic, technological and social solutions, and these must not be ignored. The big industry in bio-fuels that has sprung up in response to the need for energy efficiency is a case in point.
Revised Essay on Regional Cold Anomalies by Dr. James Hansen, With New Graphs and Photos
The Earth has been in a period of rapid global warming for the past three decades. The assertion that the planet has entered a period of cooling in the past decade is without foundation. On the contrary, we find no significant deviation from the warming trend of the past three decades. Weather fluctuations exceed the magnitude of average global warming over the past half century. However, the perceptive person should be able to notice that climate is warming on decadal time scales. The global temperature trend over the past few decades has been strong enough that there is a noticeable “loading” of the climate dice that define the probability of unusually warm or cool seasons.
Where in the World is the Worst Place for Cold Weather?
The past year, 2009, tied as the second warmest year in the 130 years of global instrumental temperature records, in the surface temperature analysis of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS). The Southern Hemisphere set a record as the warmest year for that half of the world.
James Hansen Against Cap and Trade with Offsets
The proposed climate bills in Congress are loaded with goodies for special financial and corporate interests. These bills would cheat the American public – again. Cap-and-trade was designed in part by Wall Street, which is eager to exploit a trading market expected to grow to two trillion dollars. The revolving door between Washington and Wall Street helped bring the scheme about. Yet Washington appears intent on choosing a path defined by corporate greed. Unless the public gets engaged, the present Administration may jam down the public’s throat just such an approach, which, it can be shown, is not a solution at all.
Cleaning Up the Excess CO2
The other way to reduce the air’s excess CO2 is to unbalance the carbon cycle, typically by preventing some of the CO2 captured by photosynthesis from going back into the air when cells decompose. One has to stash dead biomass where the air can’t get to it. While sealed landfills help, it is only the ocean depths that would appear to have the capacity to draw down all of the CO2 that we have added since 1750.
Global Climatic Disruption Becoming More Evident
It’s easy for people in Russia, England and on the eastern coast of the US, with the severe winter conditions they’re experiencing, to forget that on other parts of our Planet are feeling the heat of dangerous climate change. What we should remember is that what we’re witnessing is not so much “Global Warming,” or even “Climate Change,” but “Global Climatic Disruption,” the term coined by President Obama’s chief science advisor John Holdren.
