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TechnoratiClimate Change Is 'Faster and More Extreme' Than Feared
Climate change is happening much faster than the world's best scientists predicted and will wreak havoc unless action is taken on a global scale, a new report warns.
'Extreme weather events' such as the hot summer of 2003, which caused an extra 35,000 deaths across southern Europe from heat stress and poor air quality, will happen more frequently.
![[Arctic sea-ice in September 1979 and 2007, showing the biggest reduction since satellite surveillance began. (Photo: Fugro NPA Ltd)]](http://www.commondreams.org/files/article_images/climatechange1020.jpg "climatechange1020.jpg")
Britain and
the North Sea area will be hit more often by violent cyclones and the
predicted rise in sea level will double to more than a metre, putting
vast coastal areas at risk from flooding.
The bleak report from WWF - formerly the World Wildlife Fund - also predicts crops failures and the collapse of eco systems on both land and sea.
And it calls on the EU to set an example to the rest of the world by agreeing a package of challenging targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions to tackle the consequences of climate change and to keep any increase in global temperatures below 2C.
The agency says that the 2007 report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) - a study of global warming by 4,000 scientists from more than 150 countries which alerted the world to the possible consequences of global warming - is now out of date.
WWF's report, Climate Change: Faster, stronger, sooner, has updated all the scientific data and concluded that global warming is accelerating far beyond the IPCC's forecasts.
As an example it says the first 'tipping point' may have already been reached in the Arctic, where sea ice is disappearing up to 30 years ahead of IPCC predictions and may be gone completely within five years - something that hasn't occurred for a million years.
It could result in rapid and abrupt climate change rather than the gradual changes forecast by the IPCC.
The findings include:
* Global sea level rise could more than double from the IPCC's estimate of 0.59m by the end of the century.
* Natural carbon sinks, such as forests and oceans, are losing their ability to absorb CO2 from the atmosphere faster than expected.
* Rising temperatures have already led to a major reduction in food crops resulting in losses of 40m tonnes of grain per year.
* Marine ecosystems in the North and Baltic Sea are being exposed to the warmest temperatures measured since records began.
* The number and intensity of extreme cyclones over the UK and North Sea are projected to increase, leading to increased wind speeds and storm-related losses over Western and Central Europe.
The report was issued to coincide with a meeting of EU Environment Ministers today to discuss new laws aimed at tackling climate change. Some countries, including Italy and Poland, have already rejected proposals for higher cuts in emissions claiming they are unaffordable and unrealistic when many countries are facing recession.
The UK is the only country so far to commit to a legally binding 80 per cent cut in emissions by 2050 which the Government claims can be achieved by a switch to renewable energy sources - such as wind and wave - combined with a new generation of nuclear power stations.
In the report WWF urges the EU to commit to a reduction target of at least 30 per cent below 1990 levels by 2020 without relying on offsetting overseas and to provide financial support so developing countries can cut their own emissions and prepare for unavoidable impacts of climate change.
WWF-UK's Head of Climate Change, Dr. Keith Allott, said: "Climate change is a major challenge to the future of mankind and the environment, and this sobering overview highlights just how critical it is that EU environment ministers, who are meeting today to discuss EU legislation to tackle climate change, commit to a strong climate and energy package, in order to ensure a low carbon future.
"If the European Union wants to be seen as leader at UN talks in Copenhagen next year, and to help secure a strong global deal to tackle climate change after 2012, then it must stop shirking its responsibilities and commit to real emissions cuts within Europe."
The report has been endorsed by Professor Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, the newly elected Vice Chair of the IPCC, who said: "It is clear that climate change is already having a greater impact than most scientists had anticipated, so it's vital that international mitigation and adaptation responses become swifter and more ambitious."
84 Comments so far
Show AllYep and Mars has been around for a long time also, it was also once a water world like Earth. ____ Not anymore. So what ~Sjnagele~, that doesn't mean we have to continue our ignorant pollution and allow it to be so.
The earth has been around a lot longer than man and will find a way to continue to exist. Some humans are so arrogant. get over yourself, you're not that powerful.
Hallelujah!!! Praise Gaia!!! Send some more money to algore to buy carbon indulgences!!!
And, meanwhile, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil got snow in September for the first time in living memory. Global warming. Sure.
You can't even distinguish weather from climate, moron.
Here's an equation any idiot can understand: TruthTeller = Moron
Again, you are bringing a tee-ball stand to an all-star game.
And again, I will ask you skeptics GIVE US ONE SCIENTIFIC ORGANIZATION ON PAR WITH THOSE LISTED ABOVE THAT DISPROVES OR EVEN DISAGREES WITH MANMADE GLOBAL WARMING THEORIES.
All us left wing nut bags are waiting...
Waiting....
C'mon, show us something....
Waiting....
Waiting....
Waiting....
Waiting....
Oh, I couldn't find one either!
www.oneplanetonelife.com
Luckily, earth has an intelligence beyond our own. Our existence is meant to serve its purpose in some way, otherwise we wouldn't be here. We will be made to 'wake up' to this in one way or another. From the looks of it, this awakening will be a painful one, and that many will perish. We were put here to raise our consciousness, not consume everything and wallow in the mud like pigs.
"The oneness of mankind ... implies an organic change in the structure of present-day society, a change such as the world has not yet experienced ... It calls for no less than the reconstruction and the demilitarization of the whole civilized world... It represents the consummation of human evolution ... and ... carries with it no more and no less than a solemn assertion that attainment to this final stage in this stupendous evolution is not only necessary but inevitable, that its realization is fast approaching, and that nothing short of a power that is born of God can succeed in establishing it." - Baha'i Faith Statement, ARC
www.oneplanetonelife.com
Yep, I just bought a lot of thermal underwear and cold weater gear, the coming "ice age" will be brutal. Anyone have some Heterosis or a DZO for sale? We'll need their milk and fur. They're much easier to milk than a buffalo.
Boy, if the "ice age" wasn't upon us, we'd be screwed. Glas someone informed us all about it. ___Whoopie.
And the volume of arctic sea ice continued to decline this year over last year's minimum record.
Once again, we don't get the full story... seems they left off the part about the ice sheet GROWING by an area about the size of Germany in 2008... but of course now that CO2 even causes global cooling its all covered... so not to worry cult...
http://www.adn.com/news/environment/story/555283.html
I thought we settled this in another post. Here, let me cut and paste my post:
Your article is about the unprecedented melting of Alaska's glaciers, then it states that the winter of 2007-08 had alot of snowfall. Are you trying to say that this article "proves" the global warming theory wrong? You point to a news article, I point to NASA, The World's National Academy of Sciences, IPCC, International Strategic Studies, The Pentagon, and even President Bush and his EPA and Department of Energy. The evidence you are showing to disprove global warming is not in the same game, not in the same stadium, not in the same sport, not in the same universe.
You are bringing a tee-ball stand to a major league all-star game.
I will ask what I've asked many before, please show me ONE credible scientific organization, on par with the ones I've shown above, not an individual, but an organization that does not believe the man-made theory behind global warming.
I'm waiting...
"Study: Arctic warming rate could triple -
That, in turn, could quickly thaw permafrost, releasing CO2 and methane" -
The study, which was published in Geophysical Research Letters, was funded by the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation.
http://oneplanetonelife.com/opol/index.php?option=com_content&view=artic...
www.oneplanetonelife.com
These comments referring to one year's worth of ice sheet growth in some parts of Alaska miss the point entirely. The undeniable overall trend is toward warming and melting. One year's increase means nothing, especially in light of the recently altered climate patterns which have resulted in higher precipitation in some areas of the globe and appreciably lower-than-normal precip in others. Arctic precipitation comes down as snow, thereby fattening the glaciers in some places. In others, they are still retreating at record rates. Anyone who does not see global climate change for what it is - a massive alteration of the weather patterns, seasons, solar heating, ice sheets, and sea levels than what we have been used to - is, plainly, an idiot.
They miss the point indeed. The Holy Church of Global Warming, Pope algore presiding, is the new religion du jour for Christianity rejecting secular leftists. Facts mean nothing, BELIEVE BROTHER, BELIEVE!!!
Gee, no mention at all of the new and record breaking growth in the ice that has it showing at 30% larger in 2008 than in 1979.
Methinks someone is cherry picking their data for a War on Weather.
you arrive alone and naked, and that's how you go out...everything in between, on this planet, at this time, at least, is human centered and derived, including the authoritative thinking on that...
the planet is physically finite, even if the number of atoms is very large...these atoms, however, can not support life based on sheer number...the atoms must be certain kinds in certain combinations in certain ratios in certain vicinities at certain times, etc., some living, some non..if all of the earth's atoms are small plastic Burger King kidmeal 'king head' toys, for example, life will not be able to exist (where's the beef?)...even 'American salad', a generous mix of used oil, LCDs, CPUs, cell phones, shoes, tires, washers and dryers, satellites, cluster bombs, legos, pesticides, animal farm waste, phosphates and nitrates, barbie dolls, air conditioners, land mines, battleships, nuclear reactors, dams, refrigerators, CDs, DVDs, space shuttles, tvs, stereos, cars, depleted uranium and plastic king heads doesn't work, although it sounds like it should...
americans have outsourced their very responsibility for their very lives, their water, food and housing...will they take it up once again, moving to learn to drink, eat and shelter in a much more natural fashion, and will they do it in time, or will inseperable habit, seductive marketing, evolving nature or violent oppression work alone or together to deny them that opportunity? is there enough thought out there to equate an action with a consequence, enough curiosity to ask where the product I'm purchasing came from, or whether I can live without it? resources are available in abundance for life-support...they are only in short supply for industry...
snydly
Here's a guess to throw on the pile:
By the numbers---lots of ice falls off G-land, disrupts gulf stream/thermohalene circulation, a big chunk on the east side creates a tsumani that rocks European coast and those little islands-one of which is supposed to be ready to slide a third of its mountain into the ocean, creating a wake-up tsunami on the US east coast. The removal of ice mass from G-land lightens its land mass which then wants to rise, tweaking the mid-Atlantic ridge fissure which then opens like a zipper all the way to Zambiggia flash heating the A.ocean, super humidifying the atmosphere, (the Pacific ring of fire, btw, has popped by now), which then gives us the massive hemisperic storms over the poles ala Day After Tomrw--we hope. You see, that's the only good thing that can happen---because it would show that we had not yet disturbed the natural cycle enough to make this event unsurvivable. Humans have survived the previous cycles, as per the IPCC chart of ice core data, but it's starting to look like those cycles started at a point in the temp trigger spike that we may have already passed, or that is being altered by the massively-out-of-historical-norms GHG. A massive ice cap storm scenario would put some of the methane back to sleep, maybe.
At any rate, what we must do now is sell the beach house and IRA, put the petro-based activities to sleep cold turkey to stop adding heat to the ecosystem, mothball any nukes near a coast or above 30 degrees N (otherwise they get iced over, meltdown, then turn into radio-active steam chimneys spewing greenglow steam into the atmospherics already occuring, making the planet dead, and say goodbye to the grandchildren.
Other than that, it'll be a piece of cake.
I love you all.
Funniest thing I read in a long time.
You didn't mention the ice age we're going into due the termination of the thermal haline as the oceans are now dilute with fresh water.
When ever carbon emissions are cut the ice age will go into effect. Our being now in world oil production decline ensures the carbon emissions will be cut steadily and precipitously by the rosiest estimates, regardless of what people do or decide.
We should take as much of the growable soil with us as we head toward the equator. Wait much longer and we'll have to dig it out from under the glacier. We could also begin to rely more heavily on seaweed which might be farmed. We could also make submerged barges that filter the water they take into their grow hold and grow whatever crop hydroponically.
To return the oceans to salinity enough to support thermal haline thereby restoring seasons to the temperate climate zone we might float a black membrane under the ocean off the west coast of each continent to gather the sunlight warming the water toward evaporation. Then capture the water as rain in cisterns in land. Then spead an enormous paddle between ships equipped with a v shaped flow disruptor behind their props and sail them along the path of the ocean current.
Nuclear power should be discontinued. Refining nuclear fuel costs more energy than it will be worth across it's lifetime. Nuclear power is an energy drain. As are silicon based solar panels.
Solar energy is good if rendered to electricity by a heat engine (aka sterling engine) operating a turbine. The heat engine is simple, 2 pistons, one heated (fire, sun light, matters not how, connected to a cooled piston both by a mechanical aparatus as shaft to both on a small wheel mounted on a big wheel AND connected by a chamber which holds the air behind both pistons. The cooled piston can be cooled by shade, air flow, ice whatever cools.
Solutions abound, lets hope someone stops the maniac who intently brought us this far down this path before he has the pentagon build enough x45 robot attack jets to not worry how people are going to respond to his brutal regime. I think he realizes all out nuclear hostility will make this place too ugly and the cleanup too long to depend on the support of his even his most strident and heinously brutal adherents. I see that he's leaning heavily on nukes to do most of the new clearing but realize he doesn't see a sure win in it as he's taking longer to make more preparations. By Machiavelli's philosophy if he knew he was ready to annihilate as many as is his aim he'd have done it the moment he realized his preparation was suffice.
rocyahsoul@yahoo.com
www.lamegame.name
Daniel Vincent Kelley
It seems every subject is one to get angry about these days. "They did it - They're to blame"
"They are doing nothing about it"
THEY THEY THEY THEY THEY!
It's time to wake up to the reality ... They are WE - individually, ethnicly, culturally, and every other way.
Government Leaders do as they have always done - and WE don't have any absolute way to stop or change them. We empower their dictums by not changing our own behavior.
Climate Change is an inevitable conclusion - how fast and how desperate are now being measured in decades rather than centuries. What can WE do about it? Most of us - not a thing. Either we've cut our excesses to the bone or we aren't even paying attention. While I love the idea of petitioning our media to make the changes coming more mainstream accessible, most folks won't have a lot to add to the discussion except fear.
What I hope for is bright young minds with a strong survival instinct, and a desire for more life, to come up with some technologies that utilize the Earth's lessons. Perhaps some form of Methane collection to filter excesses...
What I don't find helpful is all the rage. Rage is a normal process in grief - but it is not an answer or even a "best we can do" mentality. I have never been inspired by rage to do anything. So if you're angry, calm down and consider what you can do about it. Whether you are 20 or 90 - Death is always a possiblity. If YOU can make a change DO IT - BE the example you are looking for. That's the best you can do. Or, you can simply rant and rail and condemn others for what you are unable to BE yourself. Choose your polarity. Blame and anger do not create a community of change. Whereas, if enough people do what they believe is right / will help - the possibilities multiply.
A man convinced against his will - is of the same opinion still.
Agreed, Mainestay.
The the finger points to everyone - manufacturers, politicians, consumers, and citizens. In the end, we have each demanded that this happen through our daily actions. Not to say that we aimed for a world in peril, but we have all been caught up in the dance and none have been willing or able to stop dancing.
I just watched "Heat" on Frontline. It was good, but left one key ingredient out: consumers. We have known (those not in denial) that global warming/climate change is real, yet no one seems to be able to stop consuming at a sustainable rate - myself included. What I wanted to see, what I yearn for, is an explanation of our impact as individuals and alternatives to this dead-end way of living. Inertia has kept me and most others living this way. People need to see how others are doing it.
Quite honestly there are those more to blame about this situation and they aren't we. The scale goes from the top those with the most influence typically by money (D.Rockefeller, industrial chiefs), people command (corporations, pentagon heads, goverments), media access (Media ownership, news casters, celebrities); while on the other end of the scale is people with little influence, retail workers, gas station attendants, villagers in the jungle, children...
There's no technology that needs to be invented. It all already exists and has for a long time. The industrial infrastructure so heavily dependent on finite fossil fuel was a conscious choice by a maniacal man hellbent on domination and immortality.
The solution technology is raised field agriculture, thermal depolymerization (pressure boiling) for recycling, biomass energy (steam engine by hemp fire), heat engine aka Sterling Engine, hydro power in it's numerous forms, tidal, river, water fall, wave; wind energy in it's numerous forms, balloon, tower, sky scraper; electric vehicles, motorized by brushless or brushed motor which is a simple configuration of permanent magnets and wire coil charged by battery in the case of brushless requiring a timer. Some of these clean solutions are thousands of years old. Most are probably centuries old or longer, though we will not know due the loss of the library at Alexandria that ushered in the dark age. Which incidentally was an act ordered by the emperor of that day, (most similar to today's financial dominant) and carried out by crazy Christians sold on their own superiority as has consumed so many.
rocyahsoul@yahoo.com
www.lamegame.name
Daniel Vincent Kelley
"There's no technology that needs to be invented."
I would go one further and say that part of the solution is one where no technology that is needed. Consumption is based on technology, non-consumption is not. The other side of the production equation is consumption. Ergo, the less we consume and demand, the less will be produced.
I am working with a group of people to pool resources, sort of like a loose co-op. Less consumption with no added technology.
Our first solutions should start with ourselves.
Carol
We have been killing ourselves for years and now it is coming full circle and there is nothing we can do and that is a fact.
God gave this to us for free and look what we have done. Just like all of killed him we are now killing his home that he loved so dearly and that is a fact.
MAY GOD FORGIVE US ALL AND LOVE US NOW AND FOREVER AS I AM SURE HE WILL!!!
We have become the enablers by the politicians. We the people are going to take our government back. We can do something and God will be part of that...
END MOUNTAIN TOP REMOVAL
http://www.wisecountyissues.com
How can he forgive us if we killed him? I am confused...
I have to say that if you want PBS and all those others media giants to cover the story, you should have them cover the cause of global warming. It is the unsequestering of green house gases by TOO MANY PEOPLE driving cars, heating homes, burning coal for electricity so their TVs work. We are adding a new California in terms of population every 6 months to the planet. It is the fertile rabbit problem as outlined in this old poem and totally untouched by politicians and media who lie to us about a rosy future-- if we just vote for them.
Conservationist’s Lament
By Kenneth Boulding
In: Man’s Role in Changing the Face of the Earth, 1956
University of Chicago Press, p. 1087
The world is finite, resources are scarce,
Things are bad and will be worse.
Coal is burned and gas exploded,
Forests cut and soils eroded.
Wells are dry and air’s polluted,
Dust in blowing, trees uprooted,
Oil is going, ores depleted,
Drains receive what is excreted.
Land is sinking, seas are rising,
Man is far too enterprising,
Fire will rage with Man to fan it,
Soon we’ll have a plundered planet.
People breed like fertile rabbits,
People have disgusting habits.
Moral: The evolutionary plan went astray by evolving Man.
The problem is really though waste. Vegan living is by far more efficient. This planet could support 24 billion vegans not accounting for ocean food and seaweed grows 2 feet per day. 6 billion people could fit in the state of Texas with each person alotted 1200 square feet.
There are 8 billion arable acres worldwide.
The average US diet requires 6 acres per person.
World average diet requires 1.2 acres per person.
The average vegetarian diet requires .6 acres per person.
The average vegan diet requires .3 acres per person.
To produce 1 pound of beef requires 2000-5000 gallons of water. To produce 1 pound of beef requires 16 pounds of wheat. What's worse is we're exporting meat eating, now popularizing it in cultures that were historically vegetarian.
Animal agriculture is THE biggest polluter. Worldwide 40% of people die due pollution.
Apart from immigration the US population is in decline. This is characteristic of societies with low expectation of child mortality. It is a solution that could be made global by simple education toward fighting disease and eradicating parasites and sending seeds and irrigation know how rather than bags of rice.
The solutions have been intently avoided by a maniacal immortality fiending financially dominant mass murderer. Regenerative medicine holds out the potential to extend human life indefinitely. The guy who murdered billions to hold his dominance is planning on using it to live forever as he is terrified of what the afterlife will be for him, being regularly eaten alive by dragon fly nymphs...
rocyahsoul@yahoo.com
www.lamegame.name
Daniel Vincent Kelley
I remember reading that it took about .6 acres of land to produce enough grain for one person for one year, and that didn't include other crops. Do you know the specific amount of calories and the nutrients that the .3 acres is supposed to produce? Does that account for crop rotation or anything like that or does it assume just composting? Those a very intriguing numbers! I'm curious how a person calculates something like that.
I thought we had a few decades but it looks like it will start happening sooner than expected. I notice that on the Discovery Channel and the History Channel there are unlikely disaster shows aplenty, about comets and asteroids hitting the earth, about super volcanos, etc. There are also all those prophesy programs about the world ending in 2012. Yes, on some level we know something's coming but are too complacent and stupid to admit it. I'll be 71 in 2012 and will have had a good life. I pity the young.
Perhaps hell is full of fire and not ice after all. :(
"The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in time of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality." – Dante
Rumiluv made a very good point. What if we start calling and writing our TV stations, including the stodgy PBS, the glib chatty CNN, and the lurid locals and demand coverage of global warming, polar ice cap melting, methane release etc.? I choose TV over radio because the ice cap visuals are compelling. Most TV stations don't care enough to suppress information if they see a demand that will raise advertising revenues.
Joe
btw, 'under a green sky' by peter d ward ph d. gives us an idea of what it will be like when the methane comes out..........nasty.
Hey Folks! It's not all about the CO2, even though it is going to do us in. CO2 is the world war, the total world war in which every country on the planet will be fighting. A difficult, long, drawn out war on humanity that has the potential to SIGNIFICANTLY reduce the global population and completely eradicate capitalism and civilization as we know it. HOWEVER...
As Kem has made us well aware, the methane release is not the world war that CO2 will be, it is global nuclear exchange.
Oh, and don't forget, this rampant consumption we are all getting high on, this pillaging of our natural resources, well, we are on track to run out by 2050. Besides the economic impact of a world stripped of natural resources, the global ecosystem goes down with it. The ecosystem that cleans our pollutants, grows our crops, captures our CO2, feeds us - GLOBAL ECOSYSTEM COLLAPSE due not to our CO2 or our methane, but from our consumption alone!
Oh crap! I forgot to mention the current global-level mass extinction of species that is happening as we speak due mainly to habitat destruction (i.e. the building of plazaville).
From WWF: "Effectively, the Earth’s regenerative capacity can no longer keep up with demand – people are turning resources into waste faster than nature can turn waste back into resources. For how long can this go on? A moderate business-as-usual scenario, based on United Nations projections of slow, steady growth of economies and populations, suggests that by 2050, humanity’s demand on nature will be twice the biosphere’s productive capacity. At this level of ecological deficit, exhaustion of ecological assets and large-scale ecosystem collapse become increasingly likely. "
And E.O. Wilson on current extinction: "The future of humanity is inextricably tied to the fate of the natural world. In perpetuating this, the Earth's sixth mass extinction, we may ultimately compromise our own ability to survive." - Letter to U.S. Senate by E.O. Wilson and 10 other prominent scientists.
And Peter Ward mentioned earlier: "The Father of All Mass Extinctions. There is a good possibility that losses in diversity in the present will surpass anything in the geological past. Facing that specter could shake the very tenets of conservation."
OK, if Jesus is coming down again, he better hurry!
www.oneplanetonelife.com
Coco,
What I think is even more relevant to todays scenario using the positions stated in the book "under A Green Sky" by Peter Ward (which looks like you've made your way through) is that there is incontrovertible evidence in the rocks of yesteryear that show exactly how what happened then (the Permian extinction) is happening now. I've always said the real bad stuff is going to happen when the sea bed hydrates (clathrates) begin to melt. Looks like we have defintitely begun.
Too bad it is invisible. People simply cannot wrap their heads around anything that is invisible. I believe we will only "see" once it is too late. We've begun the process of too late already.
yes you are right about it being invisible and therefore no-one really pays any attention cos they can't 'see' it..............just like radiation or micro-waves. if these components had a 'form' (maybe in the guise of george wanker bush with a scowl) people might be inclined to do more. i'm only three quarters the way through 'under a green sky' but i get the drift.
and i agree we've begun the process of 'too late' already...................
I'll write one more comment here and then shut up.
Think of this imaginary scenerio. ( Scientists discover that a massive asteroid is on a 100% sure-fire collision course with Earth, and it will hit somewhere in the South Atlantic on August 3rd at 2pm, 2011.)
If that story were so, you can bet the farm, your kids piggy bakk and or, your faltering 401-K, that ALL of the world's leaders would get together and have top levle scientists delvelop a plan to alter the flght path of that asteroid.
We have a like situation with the thawing of the Artic, which no one in their right mind can deny is happening and it's not an imaginary issue, it's real.
So why the world's leaders are not ganging up to fight it is beyod me. Why this thread will not be a permanent first thread issue for at least a month is beyond me also. ___ There is nothing on this planet Earth of more importance.
~Kem Patrick~ P/S__ Hi there ~Coco~, how ya doin?
hi kem, been wondering where you got to...............i'm doing fine here in sunny southern europe.
i like your idea about the asteroid..........so it makes me wonder if what someone above said that there is nothing we can do about the g.w./c.c. and that is why the govts. aren't really 'rushing' to do anything constructive. but hey, nothing ventured, nothing gained...........
Hi ~RUMILUV~ excellent points, we see almost nothing about this on the news. A few weeks ago CNN had a program, "Planet In Peril". They had a professor from the Univ of Alaska on and she spoke about the thaw of the Arctic's perma-frost. That's all she does, she studies the perma-frost, it's her lifetime work. She used the same words John Atcheson did in his article,__"A ticking Time Bomb" is how she also described the release of the Arctic's methane gas into our atmosphere. "Ticking time bombs" are deadly serious issues.
Time magazine did an article on the subject last month also, but no reaction from our "famous" media. I'd bet that less than 1% of the public is aware of the issue and of course our elected are oblivious of it. Even Al Gore, who has done an admirable job of advertising Global Warming has ignored the methane issue, why is amyone's guess.
Hi ~STILBA~ You sure hit a nail! Why everyone isn't scared shitles is beyond me too. This is no joke and it's not some long haired, bearded nutcase wearing a white sheet belted with a rope screaming, "the end is near."
When the Arctic finishes thawing, the end will be near and as Doctor Benton wrote, ALL LIFE, down to the microbal level will be terminated within hours when the ocean's 'currently safely stored' methane is relesed. It happened before and we humans are insuring it will happen once again. ___ Who cares?
The one picture I belive was PhotoShopped? And everything here on Earth is just fine. Why, our reticent news media hasn't said a word of this methane gas.
On a more serious note, the Arctic's methane gas is indeed real. There are those that'll believe we can "drill" our way out of this mess. Not this time. Methane is caustic, especially the amount which could very well be released by Mother Natures Artic. We're messin with the wrong ladie. She won't relent.
"Methane is caustic"
No, methane is not caustic.
From Wikipedia
Combustion
In the combustion of methane, several steps are involved:
Methane is believed to form a formaldehyde (HCHO or H2CO). The formaldehyde gives a formyl radical (HCO), which then forms carbon monoxide (CO). The process is called oxidative pyrolysis:
CH4 + O2 → CO + H2 + H2O
Following oxidative pyrolysis, the H2 oxidizes, forming H2O, replenishing the active species,[clarify] and releasing heat. This occurs very quickly, usually in significantly less than a millisecond.
2H2 + O2 →2H2O
Finally, the CO oxidizes, forming CO2 and releasing more heat. This process is generally slower than the other chemical steps, and typically requires a few to several milliseconds to occur.
2CO + O2 →2CO2
The result of the above is the following total equation:
CH4(g) + 2O2(g) → CO2(g) + 2H2O(l) + 890 kJ/mol
where bracketed "g" stands for gaseous form and bracketed "l" stands for liquid form.
It is true that no corporate politician has run on an environmental platform. But Green Party candidate Rich Whitney ran for Illinois Governor on that very platform.
Common Dreamers ignoring Green candidates is like Americans ignoring global warming warnings.
http://www.whitneyforgov.org/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=7&Itemid=15
Escaping the consequences that are upon us is not an option. Prepare yourselves now.
Yes prepare yourselves now...
Do you remember when they taught the kids to "duck and cover" in the event of a nuclear attack?
When you see the sea level rising, run for the hills along with the other 6.6 billion humans. It is gonna be really hot and sticky and crowded up there, so please dress appropriately!
Now this is the real "Change you can believe in", but it just ain't as sexy as the hero worshiping distractions of humans in denial.
Do you ever see maps showing the regression of the icecap in your daily paper or on the evening news, even the 24hr channels w/talking idiot-heads. Nothing must be done that might threaten short-term profits. Economic growth and the stock markets are all that matter. When seaboard cities are flooding CNN will immediately haul out "experts" to discuss how it will affect the stock market.
Kem Patrick
Hi ~Braithwa~ Yeah, I've gotten a bit discourged, as few seeem to accept this as a serious problem and I know of nothing more serious.
Hi ~Jack~ you are correct about the Arctic's methane, 100% correct. However, do not expect any to survve after the 400 gigatons of Arctic methane is fully released, that will set off global warming like few have ever imagined. When that disaster transpires, the really huge amounts of methane in the world's oceans will release and then the game will be over.
I have posted this link so many times I've lost track, but it is the most important article ever penned by anyone and few have ever paid much attention to it. It fully explains it all. It was first published here at Common Dreams about four years ago and we were warned and does anyone care? ____ Not very many.
http://www.energybulletin.net/3647.html
It can be read and understood in about three minutes and the man knows what he is talking about. One important sentence is: ____( Once the Arctic's methanme begins to relase, there is no turning back, no do-overs. ) ___ Well, it's started and if there is any turning back, we'd bettter try to do t NOW.
No one will do anything. Humans think they are better than nature as has already been stated.
The democrat argument about incremental changes is exactly what enviro groups do. Logic dictates promoting vegetarianism is the way to go now-but they wont do that--too radical--eating hamburger meat that was sprayed with manure or raising cattle that eat the remains of other cattle--that's mainstream thinking apparently.
Common sense is out the window.
Well, I guess that something has to destroy the ailing, corrupt capitalist system.
I would have hoped it might be human intelligence but not so! A bucket of money is superior to the human brain every time.
Global warming is the planet's response to the decadence and overwhelming greed that humans have engaged in for the last century.
It's payback time, folks. It's coming to a venue near you soon. Better put in a garden, dig a well, keep some hens, quick smart.
www.dangerouscreation.com
Considering how we're constantly discovering that this is further and faster along than we expected, and that there are more and more elements in play to make matters "even worse than we thought", my guess is that it's already WAY beyond too late to slow it down.
I am a bit surprised that people aren't scared out of their goddamn wits about this, but there is that apathy-acceptance that lets politicians get away with saying "We need a 10% reduction by 2050", or whatever the hell it is. This is political, because you can't rave about global warming and extinction if you want to get elected. Maybe it's unfortunate that we have a "democracy" at this time. If we had some god-king concerned with the longevity of his world empire, I bet we'd have seen incredible action by now. Instead, the market's decided to let its own people drown and starve.
Yes it is a real mystery why Americans are so lethargic in the face of a possible extinction event. Very strange....
snydly
That's why they call them ."extinction events"...
Another tipping point was passed this last summer: Off the Russian Arctic Ocean coast methane bubbled to the surface. The source is the methane clathrates formerly trapped beneath the seabed permafrost. A downward warm current has melted holes in the permafrost. The methane in the area atmosphere is now 100 times higher than the current worldwide atmospheric methane level. The release of methane from methane clathrates into the atmosphere is a positive feedback.
.Ironically all the calls for more offshore drilling will increase the discharge of such into our athmosphere. This by product of sea bed extraction of oil and gas is many times more dangerous to the warming of our planet than is CO2....
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We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
We seem to be creating our own gas chamber.
SO! Who actually cares? This article desn't have a story about McCain denying he's Bush, or Obama saying we have to resort to "CLEAN" Coal, or Palin telling jokes on Saturday Nite Live.
If there are comments from 30 different bloggers I'll be amazed unless 19 are from GW deniers and if this thread isn't buried in the archives by Wednesday afternoon I'll be even more amazed.
~Kem Patrick~
Many do not, will not care, if they are struggling to make ends meet, wondering how they will find the money to buy food and other necessities, while trillions are proffered to those very same corps and individuals who are raping the environment as they line their pockets at everyone else's expense. Many of these issues are interrelated, and we cannot deal with one without dealing with the others. A holistic approach is needed. Mankind is destroying itself in so many ways: socially, economically, and environmentally.
What can people do who are slaving from sunup to sundown in a factory just to make ends meet, while the corporations who employ them care only about profits and enriching investors at the expense of everything and everyone else? All these issues are beginning to come together in ways we can no longer deny--or deny at our peril. This means we cannot save the environment without addressing other related issues as well. The question is: will the majority [of us] realize this in time?
Hi Kem,
Great to hear from you after so long.
Our consumerism is not on a future collision course with the biosphere, it collided the day consumerism was defined and implemented as the economic standard and unit of measure for success. The theory and practice itself is based off a system that is so obviously unsustainable that a grade school student has enough knowledge to label it foolish and ignorant.
We have collided as a species with our only home and are in the process of following through. Sustainability will become our new measuring tool but only in the sense that it dances in relation to consumption. We need to look at our planet and life a different way. Everything we need to survive and flourish is abundantly available to us as long as we work within the confines of common sense.
Life, by definition, struggles to fill every void of our natural world, there is enough to go around. Irrational consumption, waste, and complete lack of respect for life, or respect of life with conditions, are the demons that form the foundation of our troubled world. We must let go of the assumption that Wal-Mart and Visa are providing us a true glimpse of things to come. They are not.
www.oneplanetonelife.com
The only way forward is to realise that we are all one with all we co-habit this one planet the Earth we live on.
Unfortunatley the political leaders are under the control of the Ruling Elite who want to control everything and couldn't give a damn about anything but themselves.
This pyramid system of human society has to end and end now and be replaced with an equality system where all is equal and we work together for the benefit of not just humanity but the Earth herself as we are all children of the Earth.
It is time to stop working for the benefit of the Ruling Elite and stop wasting all our time, resources and effort in destructivity of weapons and resource stripping and work for the benefit of all, together as one in creativity to better all of humanity and the Earth.
peace and love
all is illusion...there is no government
Amen!
And with the US, and China, being, by far, the world's biggest users of fossil fuels, (worse with the Bush de-regulation but we never even signed Kyoto), it would probably HELP to convince Poland and Italy, to cut their emmissions if both countries would decide to act in concert. (US and China) Until we agree to do something--we're just blowing smoke out of our ass.
I agree we need to do everything we can to change our ways. However, we can't convince everyone to do that. That's a simple, undeniable fact. The idiots in the world always far outnumber those of us who are conscientious. So the bottom line is, brace yourself. We are going down, as a species. Many individuals will be lost, many communities, many cultures. Much of the very best part of human civilization will be destroyed, as it is every time a tragedy befalls. The ancients had art, culture, literature, legal systems, social mores--almost all of which were lost through war, natural disasters, or extermination. The planet will go through a death cycle, then another life cycle will begin.
In the end, a remnant of humanity will be saved. There is always a remnant that survives. There doesn't seem to be any way to predict who or what will survive, but that's life.
If you want to see a snapshot of what life will be like when the planet starts to die, try reading Nature's End, by Strieber and Kinetka.
Most humans believe the universe is human-centric and that humans can control everything.
It is only when you realize that there is no difference between billions of little humans clinging to the face of the earth, and billions of maggots clinging to a pile of shit that the myth of human control dissipates. The earth and the universe in which it exists will survive just fine after all of the humans die, and the pile of shit will survive just fine after all of the maggots die.
A Nuremberg style proceeding for those who knowingly denied the problem in exchange for pay is entirely appropriate. In fact, I would have them tried first before the oil company executives.
No sense in stressing out about this, it will unfold as it is supposed to. No amount of human effort in the time allotted will deter these changes. Better to get ready to adapt to them rather than trying to counteract them. Besides it seems that we will burn the last drop of oil about the same time that the last ice cube is melted. Pretty significant if you ask me. GW real or imagined. Well denying it will make the reality just that much more painful. Either way we are doomed as a species. And Good riddance to us as well. We are a fluke of the universe and have no right to be here.
How do you adapt to extinction?
Accepting the mindset of "slowing down" is a good first step. Reject endless growth. Embrace light impact. Lose our ego issues that drive us to make little copies of ourself. Organize into more local communities.
How do older people adapt to their upcoming deaths?
Agreed, we all need to slow down and reject endless growth. This is done via our choices and how we live.
As far as ego issues - while it may be some ego that makes us reproduce, I would say it's more biological. Every specie on Earth lives to reproduce. The problem is, we don't know when enough is.
.A somewhat false analogy...Most species are ruled by environmental considerations as far as the reproductive urge is concerned. When food is scarce, or winter severe, or summers too dry and hot reproduction is limited. We, on the other hand, are under no such restrictions.
This is why your inference that this is an individual problem is a dangerous and not at all helpful suggestion. The problems of global warming will only be solved by a concerted effort on the part of all humanity, the individual cannot possibly cope with such as this. , excepting, in democratic nations, by the means of voting the correct politicians into office.
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We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
ardee,
I'm not your enemy, so why don't you stop manufacturing me.
I do not think that it is merely an individual problem, but waiting for governments or voting our way out of this is putting the cart before the horse.
Politicians vote for bills based on who supports them, both in terms of money and votes. They bring home the bacon for US, who support them for doing so. No one, neither the politicians, nor the corporate masters, nor we the people, have been willing to put our nation and our world before our personal interests. As long as we feed this loop, the problem will persist. Merely voting someone in who has all the right goals, even if they get elected, is bound to fail unless we have come to grips with our own proclivities. It is not an either/or problem, it is all of the above. What I am suggesting is that we, as individuals, look in the mirror, as your tag line infers. The question is, can we see ourselves as we really are? Do we even want to?
..Goodness, wherever did you get such an idea? I do not perceive you as an enemy at all..Can you not accept a differing opinion without taking offense? Frankly I see much dichotomy in your posts and really am uncertain as to where you land on loyalty and how you view the road to progress. By the by the dichotomies to which I refer is also not an attack....
My post was in response to your inference that a solution will be found through individual effort to not participate in the behaviors which lead to more such global warming. I find no attack therein, even after several readings. Your comment on reproduction needed the clarification I provided to be accurate, I believed. It contained no insult or attack.
Govts do not serve the people, they serve, in point of fact, the very lifestyles which provide the sources of global warming and provide them shelter from the wrath of an increasingly threatened people. Our society is one loud compunction to buy,buy,buy. That is the way of capitalism, make everything a profit center, and at an increasingly large cost. I see no mass awareness of this hypnosis, only isolated and fragmented opposition with no idea how to merge or proceed.
I consider myself a pragmatist of sorts, but a pragmatism that operates within strict limits. That is why I support Nader in fact instead of the status quo. That is why I cannot help but think that unless we join together and create a sea change in our governance we cannot overcome the established order. I see, in fact, the solution coming only from tragedy and necesity, if even then. I believe in technology and its abilities to find solutions to seemingly impossible problems. I see emerging technologies providing great wealth and full employment in fact. Perhaps we will fail, heck the dinosaur had sixty five million years and we have been here about twelve thousand.
I guess this post has run on a bit, sorry, it started out as an assurance that I hold you no ill will, only my own versions of the way I see things. That those differ, at times, from your own is to be expected. That there are differences is not the same thing as hostility or ill will. I have, in the past, been rather sharp with those whose posts I found to be without merit or maturity. I do not believe that yours were ever given such short shrift.
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We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
"The problems of global warming will only be solved by a concerted effort on the part of all humanity, the individual cannot possibly cope with such as this. , excepting, in democratic nations, by the means of voting the correct politicians into office."
Right and wrong. Maybe you missed Ira's latest, "Lefties for Obama." Chernus posits that the Dems represent "small but meaningful change." If you think that climate change can be reversed with "small" changes than I would say you are not in Kansas anymore, Dorthy.
.I believe that our system of governance lends itself only to small or gradual change. I also believe that the Democratic Party, as currently constituted and directioned, provides no solutions. The world is facing this problem and it will be the world that brings us to a solution. Not any individual nation, no matter how strong or wealthy.
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We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
eternally...................................................
all these 2020's, 2050's are a waste of time..............if nothing is done RIGHT now, we won't stand a chance.
James Lovelock was on UK tv the other day saying that the crucial tipping point may already be past. He was talking about the reduced albedo effect of arctic ice loss. No amount of carbon reduction, he says, will stop the oceans absorbing enormous amounts of heat that would normally be reflected. If he's right, we're in deep trouble. The world simply won't be able to produce enough food for all of us. In Europe and the US we won't starve, probably, but millions in Africa and elsewhere will, and we'll all feel the effects. Time to stop pretending we can prevent climate change.
This article was on HuffPost last night, and the Deniers and conspiracy theorists jumped all over it like flies on dead meat. The ratio might have been 3 or 4 to 1 against GW alarm.
10-12 years ago it was all the rage to be a neocon wannabe. A little Rush or Sean. Recently these folks have been taken down a peg. Now its apparently fashionable to be a GW Denier. All I can say is, No second chances Deniers. You don't know what you are risking.
RaydelCamino: You got it, but its not happening until things get even worse.
END MOUNTAIN TOP REMOVAL ! http://www.wisecountyissues.com
I hope we can hold out until January 20.
What is going to happen on January 20 that will reverse the course of global climate change??
Democrats like to emphasize, when speaking to third party voters, that if they push "lefty fringe" ideas, they'll lose election after election.
The case is often made that unless Democrats are able to attract more of the "swing either way" voters in the middle, they'll lose. Accordingly, they call for moderate, incremental changes rather than radical changes.
Democrats always make the case, always, that those on the left are "purists" and that adherence to a set of rigid ideals will result in the greater of two evils getting elected. Associated with this argument is that more Americans, often the weakest and poorest Americans, will suffer.
Each one of these arguments is a political, electoral argument. Viewed in the narrowest terms of winning and losing elections, some of these arguments, maybe even all, contain an element of truth.
Unfortunately, what these themes buy into is that winning and losing elections is an end in itself. The result of this foolishness is that neither of the two major parties is able or willing to exercise real leadership.
Does anyone believe either party is leveling with the American people about the devastation global warming will cause? Do you believe we can "technology" our way out of the crisis with no radical changes to our lifestyles?
Life on the planet hangs in the balance. While Democrats make perfectly good arguments about "helping the middle class", they fail to acknowledge, or perhaps even understand, that hundreds of millions of people might die because of global warming.
We need to throw "everything we have" at global warming. How can anyone justify spending $1.1 trillion a year on the military and, as Mr. Obama proposes, spending only $150 billion OVER TEN YEARS on developing alternative energy sources. That plan might win him an election; it might also cause hundreds of millions of deaths. But, to Democrats, winning is everything. Spelling out the truth to the American people and LEADING the nation in the right direction is somehow LESS IMPORTANT. Winning is an end in itself.
We need to localize agriculture. We cannot allow agribusiness, which uses more energy than autos or home heating, to operate unencumbered by national policy. Agriculture must be localized. Free market capitalism has no mechanism to make the radical changes global warming demands.
We need to radically reduce the number of commuter miles driven. This is not some kind of "fringe" program that lefties like. We have no choice. Again, this needs to be a government mandated program. Employers should be required to find ways to get their employees to work from home. They should be required to setup satellite offices closer to where employees live. Free market capitalism has no effective mechanism to address the problem.
Reread the base article. The devastation global warming will cause cannot be permitted to happen. It is not an "electoral choice." It is not a question of which candidate is a little better on the issue. What's at stake here is life itself.
There's a huge difference between what must be done to win an election and what must be done to take an electoral risk but provide real leadership on global warming. Americans would likely be shocked to hear some of the radical changes we'll need to make. Perhaps they would reject a candidate promoting these ideas; perhaps, on the other hand, they would respect that candidate's integrity.
Either way, what we need to "win" is our very survival; that's way more than just winning an election.
.Agribusiness, I believe, is second to automobiles in the use of petrochemicals.....
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We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
Companies should provide company housing, like they used to. This would save their workers the costs of car payments, insurance, gas and repairs. And it would save the planet.
A global New Deal that corrals global capitalism immediately is the only way to slow down this global catastrophe.
I wonder how the could-vote-either-Dem-or-Rep number compares to the voted-for-a-third-party-to-the-left-of-the-Dems number.
I also wonder what would happen if people to the left of the Democrats tried to take over the Republican Party.