SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 19, 2007
By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID AP Science Writer
(AP) A top scientist in the study of climate change says she is optimistic about public understanding of the dangers of global warming."I'm incredibly encouraged," Susan Solomon beamed after speaking to the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.Solomon, a scientist at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, was instrumental in developing the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report released earlier this month in Paris.That report reaffirmed ongoing global warming, said it is 90 percent likely to have been caused by human activity and added changes in rain and snowfall to the hotter climate expected with continuing change."Evidence of climate change is now unequivocal," she said.Changes already under way will require adaptation in the short term, Solomon said, while efforts to reduce or reverse change will only occur on a long term."I am personally an optimist" about increased governmental and public understanding of the problem, Solomon said.But, she added, "It is complicated. You can't see it, you can't smell it, you can't taste it."She likened understanding of global warming to that of the ozone hole a few years ago. Once scientists were able to tell the story clearly, the public understood it, she said. Now science is on the same track with climate change.Global warming has seen the planet's average temperature rise by more than 1 degree Fahrenheit over the last century, largely due to the addition of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere."We are forcing the climate system in a new way, outstripping the sun," Solomon said.Overall there are more warm nights and fewer cold ones, a change that affects crops and animals as well as people.Detecting change can be difficult in one place, she said, because local changes one way or the other can vary widely from the average changes around the world."It requires you to think beyond your own backyard," she said.Solomon discussed the climate change reported so far, noting that further studies due out in the spring will address the effects of the change and what actions could be taken to reduce those effects or slow or reverse change.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Global Warming Scientist Is Encouraged
AN FRANCISCO, Feb. 19, 2007By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID AP Science Writer
(AP) A top scientist in the study of climate change says she is optimistic about public understanding of the dangers of global warming."I'm incredibly encouraged," Susan Solomon beamed after speaking to the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.Solomon, a scientist at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, was instrumental in developing the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report released earlier this month in Paris.That report reaffirmed ongoing global warming, said it is 90 percent likely to have been caused by human activity and added changes in rain and snowfall to the hotter climate expected with continuing change."Evidence of climate change is now unequivocal," she said.Changes already under way will require adaptation in the short term, Solomon said, while efforts to reduce or reverse change will only occur on a long term."I am personally an optimist" about increased governmental and public understanding of the problem, Solomon said.But, she added, "It is complicated. You can't see it, you can't smell it, you can't taste it."She likened understanding of global warming to that of the ozone hole a few years ago. Once scientists were able to tell the story clearly, the public understood it, she said. Now science is on the same track with climate change.Global warming has seen the planet's average temperature rise by more than 1 degree Fahrenheit over the last century, largely due to the addition of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere."We are forcing the climate system in a new way, outstripping the sun," Solomon said.Overall there are more warm nights and fewer cold ones, a change that affects crops and animals as well as people.Detecting change can be difficult in one place, she said, because local changes one way or the other can vary widely from the average changes around the world."It requires you to think beyond your own backyard," she said.Solomon discussed the climate change reported so far, noting that further studies due out in the spring will address the effects of the change and what actions could be taken to reduce those effects or slow or reverse change.
(AP) A top scientist in the study of climate change says she is optimistic about public understanding of the dangers of global warming."I'm incredibly encouraged," Susan Solomon beamed after speaking to the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.Solomon, a scientist at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, was instrumental in developing the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report released earlier this month in Paris.That report reaffirmed ongoing global warming, said it is 90 percent likely to have been caused by human activity and added changes in rain and snowfall to the hotter climate expected with continuing change."Evidence of climate change is now unequivocal," she said.Changes already under way will require adaptation in the short term, Solomon said, while efforts to reduce or reverse change will only occur on a long term."I am personally an optimist" about increased governmental and public understanding of the problem, Solomon said.But, she added, "It is complicated. You can't see it, you can't smell it, you can't taste it."She likened understanding of global warming to that of the ozone hole a few years ago. Once scientists were able to tell the story clearly, the public understood it, she said. Now science is on the same track with climate change.Global warming has seen the planet's average temperature rise by more than 1 degree Fahrenheit over the last century, largely due to the addition of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere."We are forcing the climate system in a new way, outstripping the sun," Solomon said.Overall there are more warm nights and fewer cold ones, a change that affects crops and animals as well as people.Detecting change can be difficult in one place, she said, because local changes one way or the other can vary widely from the average changes around the world."It requires you to think beyond your own backyard," she said.Solomon discussed the climate change reported so far, noting that further studies due out in the spring will address the effects of the change and what actions could be taken to reduce those effects or slow or reverse change.
Saturday, February 3, 2007
FOX news tries to discredit UN report over Global Warming
Wow.... Yesterday I turned on the TV just in time to catch FOX news addressing the latest UN report regarding global warming. Though I can't really say that I am all that shocked, they actually were trying to discredit the findings by saying that they were put together by hundreds of politicians and not by thousands of leading scientists. To be fair, I've come to expect this type of rhetoric, having spent most of my life here in Texas, but it still is tough to swallow when you realize that your neighbors are some of the most ignorant people on the planet.
The good news though, is that the general public is starting to realize that the debate over climate change is no longer taking place, and that action must be taken soon if we want to avoid the worst case scenarios.
I'd call today's UN report a small step in the right direction, even if FOX news remains in complete denial.
The good news though, is that the general public is starting to realize that the debate over climate change is no longer taking place, and that action must be taken soon if we want to avoid the worst case scenarios.
I'd call today's UN report a small step in the right direction, even if FOX news remains in complete denial.
Thursday, February 1, 2007
No kidding!
International panel agrees global warming 'very likely' caused by humans
PARIS (AP) - Officials from 113 countries agreed Thursday that a much-awaited international report will say that global warming is "very likely" caused by human activity, delegates to a climate change conference said.
Dozens of scientists and bureaucrats are editing the new report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in closed-door meetings in Paris. Their report, which must be unanimously approved, is to be released Friday.
Two participants, speaking on condition of anonymity because the meetings are confidential, said the group approved the term "very likely" in Thursday's sessions. That means they agree that there is a 90 per cent chance that global warming is human-caused.
The last report, in 2001, said global warming was "likely" caused by human activity.
There had been speculation that the participants might try to change the wording this time to "virtually certain," which means a 99 per cent chance.
However, wording of the consensus document requires approval from all countries, including the United States and others that have rejected the Kyoto accord aimed at curbing greenhouse gas emissions.
Still, the report is considered authoritative and can influence government and industrial policy worldwide.
© The Canadian Press 2007
PARIS (AP) - Officials from 113 countries agreed Thursday that a much-awaited international report will say that global warming is "very likely" caused by human activity, delegates to a climate change conference said.
Dozens of scientists and bureaucrats are editing the new report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in closed-door meetings in Paris. Their report, which must be unanimously approved, is to be released Friday.
Two participants, speaking on condition of anonymity because the meetings are confidential, said the group approved the term "very likely" in Thursday's sessions. That means they agree that there is a 90 per cent chance that global warming is human-caused.
The last report, in 2001, said global warming was "likely" caused by human activity.
There had been speculation that the participants might try to change the wording this time to "virtually certain," which means a 99 per cent chance.
However, wording of the consensus document requires approval from all countries, including the United States and others that have rejected the Kyoto accord aimed at curbing greenhouse gas emissions.
Still, the report is considered authoritative and can influence government and industrial policy worldwide.
© The Canadian Press 2007
Monday, January 29, 2007
Climate experts slam upcoming global warming report
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Later this week in Paris, climate scientists will issue a dire forecast for the planet that warns of slowly rising sea levels and higher temperatures.
But that may be the sugarcoated version.
Early and changeable drafts of their upcoming authoritative report on climate change foresee smaller sea level rises than were projected in 2001 in the last report. Many top U.S. scientists reject these rosier numbers.
Those calculations don't include the recent, and dramatic, melt-off of big ice sheets in two crucial locations:
They "don't take into account the gorillas -- Greenland and Antarctica," said Ohio State University earth sciences professor Lonnie Thompson, a polar ice specialist. "I think there are unpleasant surprises as we move into the 21st century."
Michael MacCracken, who until 2001 coordinated the official U.S. government reviews of the international climate report on global warming, has fired off a letter of protest over the omission.
The melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are a fairly recent development that has taken scientists by surprise. They don't know how to predict its effects in their computer models. But many fear it will mean the world's coastlines are swamped much earlier than most predict.
Others believe the ice melt is temporary and won't play such a dramatic role.
That debate may be the central one as scientists and bureaucrats from around the world gather in Paris to finish the first of four major global warming reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The panel was created by the United Nations in 1988.
After four days of secret word-by-word editing, the final report will be issued Friday.
The early versions of the report predict that by 2100 the sea level will rise anywhere between 5 and 23 inches. That's far lower than the 20 to 55 inches forecast by 2100 in a study published in the peer-review journal Science this month. Other climate experts, including NASA's James Hansen, predict sea level rise that can be measured by feet more than inches.
The report is also expected to include some kind of proviso that says things could be much worse if ice sheets continue to melt.
The prediction being considered this week by the IPCC is "obviously not the full story because ice sheet decay is something we cannot model right now, but we know it's happening," said Stefan Rahmstorf, a climate panel lead author from Germany who made the larger prediction of up to 55 inches of sea level rise. "A document like that tends to underestimate the risk," he said.
"This will dominate their discussion because there's so much contentiousness about it," said Bob Corell, chairman of the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, a multinational research effort. "If the IPCC comes out with significantly less than one meter (about 39 inches of sea level rise), there will be people in the science community saying we don't think that's a fair reflection of what we know."
In the past, the climate change panel didn't figure there would be large melt of ice in west Antarctica and Greenland this century and didn't factor it into the predictions. Those forecasts were based only on the sea level rise from melting glaciers (which are different from ice sheets) and the physical expansion of water as it warms.
But in 2002, Antarctica's 1,255-square-mile Larsen B ice shelf broke off and disappeared in just 35 days. And recent NASA data shows that Greenland is losing 53 cubic miles of ice each year -- twice the rate it was losing in 1996.
Even so, there are questions about how permanent the melting in Greenland and especially Antarctica are, said panel lead author Kevin Trenberth, chief of climate analysis at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado.
While he said the melting ice sheets "raise a warning flag," Trenberth said he wonders if "some of this might just be temporary."
University of Alabama at Huntsville professor John Christy said Greenland didn't melt much within the past thousand years when it was warmer than now. Christy, a reviewer of the panel work, is a prominent so-called skeptic. He acknowledges that global warming is real and man-made, but he believes it is not as worrisome as advertised.
Those scientists who say sea level will rise even more are battling a consensus-building structure that routinely issues scientifically cautious global warming reports, scientists say.
The IPCC reports have to be unanimous, approved by 154 governments -- including the United States and oil-rich countries such as Saudi Arabia -- and already published peer-reviewed research done before mid-2006.
Rahmstorf, a physics and oceanography professor at Potsdam University in Germany, says, "In a way, it is one of the strengths of the IPCC to be very conservative and cautious and not overstate any climate change risk."
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
But that may be the sugarcoated version.
Early and changeable drafts of their upcoming authoritative report on climate change foresee smaller sea level rises than were projected in 2001 in the last report. Many top U.S. scientists reject these rosier numbers.
Those calculations don't include the recent, and dramatic, melt-off of big ice sheets in two crucial locations:
They "don't take into account the gorillas -- Greenland and Antarctica," said Ohio State University earth sciences professor Lonnie Thompson, a polar ice specialist. "I think there are unpleasant surprises as we move into the 21st century."
Michael MacCracken, who until 2001 coordinated the official U.S. government reviews of the international climate report on global warming, has fired off a letter of protest over the omission.
The melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are a fairly recent development that has taken scientists by surprise. They don't know how to predict its effects in their computer models. But many fear it will mean the world's coastlines are swamped much earlier than most predict.
Others believe the ice melt is temporary and won't play such a dramatic role.
That debate may be the central one as scientists and bureaucrats from around the world gather in Paris to finish the first of four major global warming reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The panel was created by the United Nations in 1988.
After four days of secret word-by-word editing, the final report will be issued Friday.
The early versions of the report predict that by 2100 the sea level will rise anywhere between 5 and 23 inches. That's far lower than the 20 to 55 inches forecast by 2100 in a study published in the peer-review journal Science this month. Other climate experts, including NASA's James Hansen, predict sea level rise that can be measured by feet more than inches.
The report is also expected to include some kind of proviso that says things could be much worse if ice sheets continue to melt.
The prediction being considered this week by the IPCC is "obviously not the full story because ice sheet decay is something we cannot model right now, but we know it's happening," said Stefan Rahmstorf, a climate panel lead author from Germany who made the larger prediction of up to 55 inches of sea level rise. "A document like that tends to underestimate the risk," he said.
"This will dominate their discussion because there's so much contentiousness about it," said Bob Corell, chairman of the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, a multinational research effort. "If the IPCC comes out with significantly less than one meter (about 39 inches of sea level rise), there will be people in the science community saying we don't think that's a fair reflection of what we know."
In the past, the climate change panel didn't figure there would be large melt of ice in west Antarctica and Greenland this century and didn't factor it into the predictions. Those forecasts were based only on the sea level rise from melting glaciers (which are different from ice sheets) and the physical expansion of water as it warms.
But in 2002, Antarctica's 1,255-square-mile Larsen B ice shelf broke off and disappeared in just 35 days. And recent NASA data shows that Greenland is losing 53 cubic miles of ice each year -- twice the rate it was losing in 1996.
Even so, there are questions about how permanent the melting in Greenland and especially Antarctica are, said panel lead author Kevin Trenberth, chief of climate analysis at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado.
While he said the melting ice sheets "raise a warning flag," Trenberth said he wonders if "some of this might just be temporary."
University of Alabama at Huntsville professor John Christy said Greenland didn't melt much within the past thousand years when it was warmer than now. Christy, a reviewer of the panel work, is a prominent so-called skeptic. He acknowledges that global warming is real and man-made, but he believes it is not as worrisome as advertised.
Those scientists who say sea level will rise even more are battling a consensus-building structure that routinely issues scientifically cautious global warming reports, scientists say.
The IPCC reports have to be unanimous, approved by 154 governments -- including the United States and oil-rich countries such as Saudi Arabia -- and already published peer-reviewed research done before mid-2006.
Rahmstorf, a physics and oceanography professor at Potsdam University in Germany, says, "In a way, it is one of the strengths of the IPCC to be very conservative and cautious and not overstate any climate change risk."
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
We must begin to care!
Everyday our world moves precariously closer to disaster. This site has been created to try and educate the masses, stop the incompetence of governments, and bring about change. For all those who love our earth, continue to do what you can and never stop caring.
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