Author: Bryan Walker

The Rising Sea

“All indications are that we should be alarmed about the future of sea level rise and should be doing something about it now.”  Orrin Pilkey and Rob Young, eminent coastal scientists, wrote their book The Rising Sea to provide substance for that alarm and to offer suggestions as to how we can plan ahead to reduce the severity of the impact of the rising sea.

The authors begin by reminding us that it’s not a distant prospect. They describe what is happening to Alaskan shoreline villages such as Kivalina and Shishmaref, atoll nations such as Kiribati, the Maldives, the Marshall Islands, Tokelau and Tuvalu, and the city of Venice, places already grappling with rising sea level.

Rising tide gauge data and an increase in coastal erosion along many of the planet’s shorelines provide clear evidence of the rising sea and of the warming of the planet. Not that the authors are simplistic about this. They recognise and discuss the function of tectonic changes and additions to or subtractions from the weight of the crust.  But there is plenty of evidence of an increase in the volume of water in the oceans, accelerating in response to global warming. Easier evidence to assemble, they note, than the measurement of global temperature trends.

Predictions of rise in the 21st century are dependent on what happens in the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets, an area which the IPCC 2007 report felt unable to take into its compass, other than by commenting that the contribution from both of these ice sheets may be much larger than previously assumed.  Pilkey and Young do not offer predictions, but they note that some organisations in the US have begun to make their own, quoting for example a committee in one of Florida’s counties which speaks of a minimum of 1 to 1.5 metres. They further note the work of University of Colorado scientist Tad Pfeffer and colleagues who argued in a 2008 paper in Science for a range between 0.9 and 2.0 metres, and they describe Hansen’s understanding that the non-linear response of the ice sheets could mean a level higher than that, possibly even as much as 5 metres. Shoreline retreat, of great importance to human society, is difficult to predict.  It’s not a simple or uniform matter and they discuss some of the variable regional factors which have to be taken into consideration in any assessments.   Their conclusion is that coastal management and planning should assume ice sheet disintegration will continue and a 2 metre sea level rise by 2100 should be reckoned with. They describe this as a cautious and conservative approach.  All rubbish, of course, to the noisy minority of opinion they address in a chapter on what they call the sea of denial.

The later sections of the book are concerned with the impacts of rising sea level.  First on natural ecosystems. The coastal wetlands and coral reef ecosystems have long migrated back and forth along with changing sea level and attendant shoreline movement. But they haven’t before had to simultaneously cope with massive changes in the physical environment cause by human activities.  Their future is unprecedented. The biggest global obstacle to salt marsh movement, for instance, is shoreline development and agriculture. There is often little room for them to expand inland.  Many will disappear, a loss both environmental and economic as yet recognised by few governments.  Mangrove areas have already been significantly reduced globally, most recently by clearing for agriculture and aquaculture. Poverty in the developing world leveraged by greed in the developed world is the driver of their destruction. Coral reefs are threatened by more factors than sea level rise, but their need for sunlight means that they must either grow upwards or migrate to shallower water to survive rising seas.

The authors then turn to the impact of sea level rise on humans.  The principal nation-scale impacts are likely to include loss of land, flooding, increased storm surge vulnerability, accelerated erosion, increased salinization, loss of biodiversity, loss of aquaculture and fishery, damage to marine infrastructure, and tourist decline.  The countries with the biggest problems are the atoll nations; deltaic countries such as Egypt, the Nethlerlands, Bangladesh, Vietnam and Myanmar; and countries with large low-lying, heavily developed coastal plains such as the US, Brazil and China. (As an aside I note that the severe effects of climate change on the US and China may be our best hope that they will act decisively to reduce emissions, once, that is, denialism loses its remaining traction among their lawmakers.) The book details the specifics faced by some of those countries.  In Vietnam, for example, a one metre sea level rise will displace more than a tenth of the nation’s people, gobble up 12 percent of its land area, and reduce food output by 12 percent.  Turning to cities the book notes an OECD study ranking the most vulnerable cities in the world as measured by susceptibility of property to flooding.  Half of the top ten are American, headed by Miami.

A closer look at the Mississippi delta forms the substance of a chapter.  The authors describe  various proposals to restore and protect the Louisiana coast and are sympathetic to some of them, such as wetland restoration.  But the vast and costly restoration effort now being sold to the residents of Louisiana and the rest of the US they consider misleading and dangerous.  Conditions in southern Louisiana are likely only to get worse no matter how much money is spent. Global sea level rise is coming. Coastal managers need to begin developing a plan to relocate towns in the lower delta, in ways which will keep the communities together. The delta culture may be preserved, but not in place.

The final chapter is titled Sounding Retreat.  It focuses on how Western countries need to respond to the landward movement of the shoreline.  The authors identify three responses: abandonment of the beachfront and relocation of all buildings and infrastructure away from the retreating shoreline; protection of the shoreline with seawalls, groins, and suchlike; formation of an artificial beach by bringing in new sand. All are expensive, but the latter two are temporary and suitable only for small rises in sea level. (No problem for Bjorn Lomborg who estimates a 30 centimetre rise.) The implications of each of these approaches are discussed in some detail with reference to specific examples. Opposition to relocation often comes from those with vested interests, and Florida extraordinarily still permits the construction of high rise shoreline buildings, taking over the financial obligation since insurance companies have backed away from insuring coastal properties. But the authors consider that in many cases relocation of beachfront communities will be the most effective solution, especially in view of the tremendous effort that will be needed to protect exposed cities.

We’re for it, the authors warn. Reduction of emissions will not halt sea level rise in the short term.  If we’re wise we’ll plan ahead. The constructive discussions and examples in their easily understood book will assist those who want to get an initial understanding both of the possible magnitude of what faces us and of the kind of measures we will need to take to manage it with the least distress. The book is well worth attention.

Miliband: denialism profoundly dangerous

At risk of further accusation of being over-impressed by politicians’ words I welcome what Ed Miliband is reported as saying in today’s leading articlein the Observer. He declared a “battle” against the “siren voices” who denied global warming was real or caused by humans, or that there was a need to cut carbon emissions to tackle it.

His interview with the Observer is described as his first response to University of East Anglia scientists being accused of witholding information and to the IPCC Himalayan glacier error.  He said it would be wrong to use a mistake to somehow undermine the overwhelming picture that’s there.  He described in broad terms the basic physics and the observed effects that point to the existence of human-made climate change, pointing out that “that’s what the vast majority of scientists tell us”.  He cited the thousands of pages of evidence in the IPCC report and was adamant that the IPCC was on the right track.

 

The danger of climate scepticism was that it would undermine public support for unpopular decisions needed to curb carbon emissions, including the likelihood of higher energy bills for households, and issues such as the visual impact of wind turbines. Miliband is energy secretary as well as climate secretary.

“There are a whole variety of people who are sceptical, but who they are is less important than what they are saying, and what they are saying is profoundly dangerous… to take what the sceptics say seriously would be a profound risk.”

That strikes me as plain speaking from a politician.  It would surprise the New Zealand populace if s senior minister here spoke in such terms.

Miliband also went on to acknowledge the “disappointment” of Copenhagen, though noting that there were also achievements including the agreement by countries responsible for 80% of emissions to set domestic carbon targets by today. I liked what he added: “There’s a message for people who take these things seriously: don’t mourn, organise.” He has previously called for a Make Poverty History-style mass public campaign to pressure politicians into cutting emissions.

Meanwhile back here in New Zealand yesterday’s Herald provided an example of how readily wild accusations levelled at IPCC scientists can make it into the journalistic canon. I wrote a few days ago about the UK Sunday Times’ untruthful article on the IPCC and predicted it would be reported uncritically by other newspapers.  Right on cue a Herald writer, reporting on the NIWA decision to put its temperature data on the web, at the end of her report listed the Sunday Times article as one of three items under the heading “IPCC’s Intemperate Year in the Headlines”.

Hansen: it can be cold in a warming world.

“If it’s that warm, how come it’s so darned cold?” is the heading James Hansen has given to a recently finalised essay circulated to his email list. In more sober terms he subtitles it Regional Cold Anomalies within Near-Record Global Temperature. 

The essay explains how the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) goes about analyzing global temperature change, using electronic receipt of data from three sources: (1) weather data for several thousand meteorological stations, (2) satellite observations of sea surface temperature, and (3) Antarctic research station measurements. And for those who might suggest that there’s secret manipulation going on Hansen makes it clear that the data is available for others who want to use it:

 

“Although the three input data streams that we use are publicly available from the organizations that produce them, we began preserving the complete input data sets each month in April 2008. These data sets, which cover the full period of our analysis, 1880-present, are available to parties interested in performing their own analysis or checking our analysis. The computer program used in our analysis can be downloaded from the GISS web site.”

The results are that 2009 tied (with 1998, 2002, 2003, 2006 and 2007 – differences too close to matter) as the second warmest year in the 130 years of global instrumental temperature record.  The warmest was 2005.  Hansen discusses the variance of the GISS figures with the Hadley Centre (HadCRUT) which has 1998 as the warmest year, and which has been used so frequently to support claims that the globe since 1998 is now cooling. After careful comparison he concludes that the differences that have developed between the GISS and HadCRUT global temperatures are due primarily to the extension of the GISS analysis into regions that are excluded from the HadCRUT analysis. He expresses a reasonable degree of confidence in the GISS preference for 2005. Over the decade the conclusion is easier: the world has become warmer, not cooler.

What about that cold 2009 December?  There was an unusual exchange of polar and mid-latitude air in the northern hemisphere, related to the most extreme Arctic Oscillation since the 1970s. His conclusion is that December 2009 was a highly anomalous month. High pressure in the polar region can be described as the “cause” of the extreme weather. There is no apparent basis for expecting frequent repeat occurrences of December 2009 conditions, though high winter variability including cold snaps will surely continue.

Further discussion of seasonal temperature anomalies leads to the observation that the change in the probability that the seasonal mean temperature at any given location will fall in the category that was defined as unusually warm during 1951-1980 has increased from 30 percent during that period to about 60 percent today. This will be illustrated in an upcoming publication.

The bottom line?

“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.”

I haven’t attempted to offer any of the detail with which Hansen builds his conclusions, but can report it as readily accessible to the lay person prepared to give it reasonably patient attention. The essay is another example of his skill in communicating serious science to non-scientists and of his laudable willingness to do so.

His preliminary remarks are worth separate attention. He notes that scientists reporting global warming have come under attack for a supposed conspiracy to manufacture evidence of global warming. Vicious personal messages are sent to the principal scientists almost daily.

“The spiral into an almost surrealistic situation with ad hominem attacks on scientists may have originated in part with vested interests who do not want society to address climate change. But there is more than that – including honest, wishful thinking that climate change is not really happening. But wishing does not alter facts.”

He stoutly supports the work of scientists:

“The scientific method practically defines integrity… All scientists make honest mistakes, but the scientific method is designed to correct them. The skeptical nature of the scientific method causes conclusions to be reexamined as new data appears. Cases of deliberate fudging of data, of scientific fraud, are so rare that these infrequent episodes live in infamy for decades and even centuries.”

He knows of no cases of fraud in analyses of global temperature measurements. In the face of unfounded accusations “our best approach is simply to continue to report our scientific results as clearly as possible.”

He thinks that most of the public continue to respect scientists for what they do and how they do it. I hope he’s right. Sometimes I think the forces of denial have taken on the aspect of a rampaging demonic power, against which the forces of quiet reason are for the time being ineffectual.

UK Sunday Times’ sloppy journalism attacks IPCC

A couple of days ago one of Hot Topic’s denialist commenters triumphantly waved a UK Sunday Times article claiming that the IPCC had erred not only in relation to the likely rate of melting of Himalayan glaciers but also in linking global warming to an increase in the number and severity of natural disasters.

I had a quick look at the IPCC report referred to and responded  by pointing out that the section pointed to by the Sunday Times wasn’t about the frequency of extreme events but about their costs.

I think the matter is worth longer treatment than I gave it there, because it is an example of shocking carelessness, if not deliberate misrepresentation, passing itself off as responsible journalism on climate change.  The Sunday Times article was written by Jonathan Leake, their science and environment editor.

We’ve caught the IPCC at it again, he virtually proclaims.  The IPCC has based its claims that natural disasters are increasing as a result of global warming on an unpublished report that had not been subjected to routine scientific scrutiny. On this slender basis developing nations have demanded compensation from rich nations and Ed Miliband, Barack Obama and Gordon Brown have been led into exaggerated statements.

It was news to me that the whole question of the frequency of severe events rested on a single report, and it rapidly becomes apparent in Leake’s report that he is confused (I hope not disingenuous). Here is what he writes:

“The new controversy also goes back to the IPCC’s 2007 report in which a separate section warned that the world had ‘suffered rapidly rising costs due to extreme weather-related events since the 1970s’.

“It suggested a part of this increase was due to global warming and cited the unpublished report, saying: ‘One study has found that while the dominant signal remains that of the significant increases in the values of exposure at risk, once losses are normalised for exposure, there still remains an underlying rising trend.’”

Costs? Losses? This must surely be from Working Group II of the IPCC which deals with the impacts of climate change, not from Working Group I which deals with the physical science.  And so it proved.  The study he talks about  is by Robert Muir-Wood, of the London consultancy Risk Management Solutions.  It is referred to in a short section on economic and insurance losses, part of a longer section on disasters and hazards. The inference that this paper is the basis of the IPCC’s findings on the frequency and severity of natural disasters is simply ridiculous.  Here is what the IPCC says of Muir-Woods paper:

“A global catalogue of catastrophe losses was constructed (MuirWood et al., 2006), normalised to account for changes that have resulted from variations in wealth and the number and value of properties located in the path of the catastrophes, using the method of Landsea et al. (1999). The global survey was considered largely comprehensive from 1970 to 2005 for countries and regions (Australia, Canada, Europe, Japan, South Korea, the USA, Caribbean, Central America, China, India and the Philippines) that had centralised catastrophe loss information and included a broad range of peril types: tropical cyclone, extratropical cyclone, thunderstorm, hailstorm, wildfire and flood, and that spanned high- and low-latitude areas.

“Once the data were normalised, a small statistically significant trend was found for an increase in annual catastrophe loss since 1970 of 2% per year (see Supplementary Material Figure SM1.1). However, for a number of regions, such as Australia and India, normalised losses show a statistically significant reduction since 1970. The significance of the upward trend is influenced by the losses in the USA and the Caribbean in 2004 and 2005 and is arguably biased by the relative wealth of the USA, particularly relative to India.”

A restrained statement, I’d have thought, and certainly staying firmly within the topic of costs, not using the Muir-Wood paper as a basis for evidence on the wider question of increased frequency of severe events.  There are statements in many places in the IPCC report about changes in extremes and disasters, and it is absurd to treat this one section and this one paper as the basis of what it has to say.  How on earth does a journalist carrying the responsibility for science and environment on a major newspaper not know that?  I was pleased to see the IPCC issue a statement on Monday firmly refuting the Sunday Times article as misleading and baseless.  The first point their statement makes is:

“[The Sunday Times article] incorrectly assumes that a brief section on trends in economic losses from climate-related disasters is everything the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (2007) has to say about changes in extremes and disasters. In fact, the Fourth Assessment Report reaches many important conclusions, at many locations in the report, about the role of climate change in extreme events. The assessment addresses both observations of past changes and projections of future changes in sectors ranging from heat waves and precipitation to wildfires. Each of these is a careful assessment of the available evidence, with a thorough consideration of the confidence with which each conclusion can be drawn.”

(A convenient summary of what Working Group I has to say may be seen in their Frequently Asked Questions section . The question ‘Has there been a change in extreme events?’ is responded to on p.107, and the question ‘Can Individual Extreme Events be Explained by Greenhouse Warming?’ on p.119.  Both answers are restrained and cautious.)

But even on the matter of trends in economic losses and disasters the Sunday Times has grossly misrepresented the IPCC, as Monday’s IPCC refutation adds:

“The second problem with the article in the Sunday Times is its baseless attack on the section of the report on trends in economic losses from disasters. This section of the IPCC report is a balanced treatment of a complicated and important issue. It clearly makes the point that one study detected an increase in economic losses, corrected for values at risk, but that other studies have not detected such a trend. The tone is balanced, and the section contains many important qualifiers. In writing, reviewing, and editing this section, IPCC procedures were carefully followed to produce the policy-relevant assessment that is the IPCC mandate.”

The full section is here on p.110 if you want to check the veracity of that judgement.

The Sunday Times article is simply untrue. It is lazy, sloppy journalism at best, deliberate misinformation at worst.   It has been taken up trumphantly by the denialist world and reported widely and uncritically by other newspapers. I hope the paper is ashamed of what it has achieved, but I fear it will be rejoicing at the attention it has gained.

Welcome words from a politician

“This is a century in which we will recognise that living within your means can no longer just be about money, but also must be about first living within your carbon means and second living within the natural world’s ability to support humankind over issues like fishing and deforestation.”

I took pleasure in the these words from UK Environment Secretary Hilary Benn, reported in the Guardian today, while realising that I open myself to the accusation of being too ready to credit that a politician can mean what he or she says.

Benn is calling for a way to be found to price the impact of our decisions on biodiversity in the same way that the international community is finding a way of pricing carbon. He warns that the world may be going through its sixth great extinction event.  He’s hoping that a report being prepared for the European commission by the Deutsche Bank economist Pavan Sukhdev into the economics of ecosystems and biodiversity may “do for our understanding of the natural world what Nick Stern did for the understanding of the economic impact of climate change.”

“Stern made people sit up and take notice. Stern said ‘this is the cost of dealing with climate change and this is the cost of not dealing with it.’ Stern brought this issue to the attention of business people and economists. We have to realise we live in a world where we can no longer take without consequence”.

Earlier in the month Benn contributed an opinion piece in the BBC’s Green Room series explaining his biodiversity concern at greater length. He was careful to conjoin it with climate change: “Climate change and biodiversity are inextricably linked. We ignore natural capital at our peril.”

Benn is only saying what many scientists have been pointing out for some years.  But it matters that politicians should be saying it.  The general populace needs to hear it from them.  It’s called political leadership and it has often mattered at critical times in the past.  I commented in an earlier post on the willingness of the Milliband brothers and Gordon Brown to speak unequivocally about climate change to the UK electorate. John Prescott was similarly outspoken and active in the lead-up to Copenhagen.

Admittedly the Copenhagen experience was dispiriting in relation to the rhetoric we were increasingly hearing from political leaders beforehand.  Benn will address that fact in a speech he is due to deliver tomorrow, when he will say that a way has to be found to reverse “the collective loss of personal, economic and environmental optimism”.

Our own political leadership is not given to statements like that of Benn’s which opened this post.  I realise they make a virtue of not wanting to promise more than they can deliver, but the New Zealand electorate needs to hear unequivocally from the government (and from the main opposition party for that matter) that climate change and biodiversity loss are supremely important issues, with the corollary that our catching up with Australian incomes is a rather lesser matter.