From the department of bad news: global carbon dioxide emissions are speeding up, and one of the world’s largest natural carbon-absorbing sinks, the ocean to the south of New Zealand, is showing signs of becoming saturated.
RealClimate » Start here
RealClimate’s latest post, Start here, is a very useful pointer to global warming information resources on the web:
We’ve often been asked to provide a one stop link for resources that people can use to get up to speed on the issue of climate change, and so here is a first cut. Unlike our other postings, we’ll amend this as we discover or are pointed to new resources. Different people have different needs and so we will group resources according to the level people start at.
I’ll stick it on the Hot Topic permanent links page, when we get one.
Disinformation services
According to the Timaru Herald, Augie Auer has comprehensively “debunked” global warming:
Climate change will be considered a joke in five years time, meteorologist Augie Auer told the annual meeting of Mid Canterbury Federated Farmers in Ashburton this week. Man’s contribution to the greenhouse gases was so small we couldn’t change the climate if we tried, he maintained. “We’re all going to survive this. It’s all going to be a joke in five years,” he said.
Phew, that’s a relief.
Or is it? Let’s have a look at what NZ’s most prominent sceptic is arguing.
Melting at both ends
Arctic sea ice is melting. The Greenland ice sheet is losing mass, and the Antarctic Peninsula is one of the fastest warming parts of the planet. But the main part of Antarctica has often been assumed to be pretty safe from extensive surface melting. It’s very cold, and very high. NASA now reports that in January 2005, large parts of the surface of West Antarctica experienced a week long melt, the first time this has been seen.
“The observed melting occurred in multiple distinct regions, including far inland, at high latitudes and at high elevations, where melt had been considered unlikely. Evidence of melting was found up to 900 kilometers (560 miles) inland from the open ocean, farther than 85 degrees south (about 500 kilometers, or 310 miles, from the South Pole) and higher than 2,000 meters (6,600 feet) above sea level. Maximum air temperatures at the time of the melting were unusually high, reaching more than five degrees Celsius (41 degrees Fahrenheit) in one of the affected areas. They remained above melting for approximately a week.”
The picture accompanying the NASA story clearly shows large melt areas – the size of California (how many Belgiums is that?) – over the West Antarctic ice sheet. There hasn’t been a repeat of the event in the last two years, and the period studied only began in 1999, so it’s not clear how unusual the melt was, or if there is any trend. Given the concerns about the stability of the West Antarctic ice sheet in a warming world, this news will add urgency to this year’s International Polar Year effort (which is getting a bit of help from the International Space Station).
Elephants, forests and the Wright brothers
Tropical forests are in the news. The Global Canopy Project has announced its Vivocarbon Initiative, an effort to encourage a rapid reduction in the felling of tropical forests. The GCP study forest canopies, and judging from the back page of their Forests First In The Fight Against Climate Change (PDF) describing their new campaign, they have a lot of fun doing it. Their point is simple, and supported by the IPCC WG3, Stern and others:
“Tropical rainforests are the elephant in the living room of climate change. It is unwise for politicians to arm wrestle over rising aircraft emissions when just the next five years of carbon from burning rainforests (20% of global GHG emissions) will be greater than all the emissions from air travel since the Wright brothers to at least 2025. Forests must come first in efforts to mitigate global carbon emissions because carbon capture or nuclear technology will make no major impact on reducing emissions before 2030, whilst we can tackle deforestation now, without the need for inventing new and expensive infrastructure.