The Last Frost

The Doomsday clock which is maintained by The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists is set to move forward on January 17th due to increasing nuclear and climate threats. The last time it moved forward was in 2002, and today it stands at 7 minutes to midnight.

The group was founded in 1945 shortly after the atomic bombs were dropped on Japan, they created the clock 2 years later. The purpose of the clock is to illustrate how close our world is to destruction by nuclear war. It's interesting that a group so focused on nuclear issues is considering climate change in this latest move towards midnight. 

Their site at thebulletin.org, currently displays a splash page saying they'll be making a media announcement this Wednesday.  

Scientists prepare to move Doomsday Clock forward - [Reuters.com]

Shall we change or shall we give up and accept what comes to us? I say let's change… some say fuck it, I say fuck that.

AlterNet: EnviroHealth: Global Warming is Here. Now What?

How the oil companies swindle all of us out of $300,000 annually with a small amount of cash that adds up over time. 

Gasoline Prices: Why $2.189 and not $2.19; Why The Third Decimal Place? - [TheTaoOfMakingMoney.com]

Climate change may be a distant threat to most, or not a threat at all to some. Many Alaskan's on the other hand, are experiencing climate change today; and it's affecting whole communities.  

The loss of permafrost and sea ice which leaves coasts vulnerable to the battering of the ocean waves has led to the need to move entire communities and their infrastructure to safer ground, at an extreme cost.

Alaska natives left out in the cold - [BBC News]

Global warming and El Nino are predicted by Britain's Meteorological Office to take the blame for the warmest year on record for our planet, 2007. The 10 hottest years on record have occurred since 1994, 2006 is set to be the sixth hottest as reported by Reuters. 

If the 70 degree weather we had in New York City this past Saturday was any indication, I think they're right.

2007 predicted to be world's warmest year - [Reuters.com]

On January 2nd, Fox News recently aired a bit on the abnormally warm weather the East Coast has been experiencing and how the media is hyping it all up to global warming. The funny thing is that both of their correspondents agree with each other… so where’s the counter argument? 

There was none, which isn’t really a surprise for the Fair and Balanced News organization. They made some funny comments during the bit though. Patrick Michaels is a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute which is a libertarian think tank based out of D.C. He’s got himself a nice reputation as a global warming skeptic. What’s funny is that he makes a statement that goes like this, "if you believe that warming causes cooling, you’re like my neighbors down in Virginia who think that if you put hot water in the ice cube tray it freezes faster". 

This statement pisses me off because when I was in High School I asked my Chemistry teacher if this very thing was true. He said, "no of course not" and I went back to sleep at my desk, unsatisfied. Years later I heard about this thing called the Mpemba effect. Hot water can freeze faster than cold water, and Patrick Michaels is a jackass. If a wikipedia article doesn’t convince you, check this out.

So what though, he got a simple scientific fact which happens to defy common sense wrong. What’s bad is that warming can in fact cause cooling contrary to what this guy thinks. It’s a simple case of feedback loops and science.

Here’s a completely hypothetical example: 

1) The globe warms

2) Polar ice melts (ice is fresh water)

3) Oceans are saltwater and they get diluted by the deluge of fresh water. 

4) Fresh water holds less heat than salt water, so the Earth’s oceans are less able to hold onto their heat.

5) Earth loses heat through the "freshened" ocean’s triggering an ice age.

Warming caused cooling… and Patrick Michaels is still an idiot even though he’s a "contributing author and reviewer of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change". 

FOX News lacks balance on environmental discussion - [You Tube]

So Called "Myth" #10: The earth’s poles are warming; polar ice caps are breaking up and melting and the sea level rising.

Their Argument In It's Entirety: "The earth is variable. The western Arctic may be getting somewhat warmer, due to unrelated cyclic events in the Pacific Ocean, but the Eastern Arctic and Greenland are getting colder. The small Palmer Peninsula of Antarctica is getting warmer, while the main Antarctic continent is actually cooling. Ice thicknesses are increasing both on Greenland and in Antarctica." [Read the Friends of Science's other arguments here]

The Truth: Yes, the Earth is variable, but the Earth is not this variable. At least not in recent times, and by recent I'm talking the last 10,000 years.

They argue that small parts of the Arctic are getting warmer while the rest of it is actually getting colder. They are talking about regional variations here not the big picture, so it's irrelevant even if it's true.

The main point they make though is that the ice is thickening in Greenland and Antarctica. Is this part of it true? Who would you trust, these guys who have lied in almost every single argument they made, or NASA. 

"When the scientists added up the overall gains and losses of ice from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, there was a net loss of ice to the sea." [NASA - Impact of Climate Warming on Polar Ice Sheets Confirmed, March, 2006] 

These guys just suck.

Common misconceptions about global warming - [Friends of Science]

So Called "Myth" #9: Receding glaciers and the calving of ice shelves are proof of global warming.

Their Argument In It's Entirety: "Glaciers have been receding and growing cyclically for hundreds of years. Recent glacier melting is a consequence of coming out of the very cool period of the Little Ice Age. Ice shelves have been breaking off for centuries. Scientists know of at least 33 periods of glaciers growing and then retreating. It’s normal. Besides, glacier's health is dependent as much on precipitation as on temperature." [The Full Friends of Science Myth Page]

The Truth: The child in me just wants to write, "ice melting isn't due to warming? You idiots?!" but I'll elaborate a bit more for fairness.

A trip over the articulate folks at RealClimate.org revealed an article about the very recent retreat of tropical glaciers, of which Mt. Kilimanjaro is included. That these tropical glaciers lie right in the path of our planet's most intense solar radiation and yet continue to exist is amazing and a testament to our planets stability but before I get off the point heres an excerpt. 

"The widespread retreat is all the more notable because tropical mountain glaciers are old. They have survived thousands of years of natural climate fluctuations, only to dwindle at a time when other climate indicators — notably surface temperature — are showing the imprint of human influence on climate. Quelccaya is at least 1500 years old, Dasuopo is 9000 years old, and Huascaran has seen 19000 years. A date for the ultimate demise of these glaciers has not been fixed, but the Northern Ice Field on Kilimanjaro may be gone in as little as twenty years, after having survived the past 11,000 years." [RealClimate.org, 2005]

Nothing in our naturally variable Earth has been able to melt the tropical glacier on Mt. Kilimanjaro for 11,000 years, yet we may do it in as little as 250. Are these glaciers our planet's canary in the coal mine?

Common misconceptions about global warming - [Friends of Science]

So Called "Myth" #8: Global warming will cause more storms and other weather extremes.

Their Argument In It's Entirety: "There is no scientific or statistical evidence whatsoever that supports such claims on a global scale.  Regional variations may occur. Growing insurance and infrastructure repair costs, particularly in coastal areas, are sometimes claimed to be the result of increasing frequency and severity of storms, whereas in reality they are a function of increasing population density, escalating development value, and ever more media reporting." [Link to their original argument]

The Truth: There is limited scientific evidence and thank goodness there is no statistical evidence yet. This is a difficult myth to bust because they make some good points. They still left me some wiggle room though.

First off it's true that the damage from storms is increasing because of an increase in population density, value of property and things like that. Since it affects more people, it gets more media coverage. So I'll give these guys that.

As for the whole no evidence or statistics line, it's consistent with every other argument that they have made that wasn't a flat out lie. They only tell half the truth.

Weather itself is primarily caused by one thing, the unequal heating of the Earth by the Sun. So will global warming alone cause more severe weather? It's hard to say, if the Earth is heated more unevenly then sure, you could probably safely assume that that could lead to more severe weather. If it warms in a mostly uniform manner, then perhaps there won't be much of a change. 

There is one thing that we do know for sure though. Hurricanes develop from tropical storms when the ocean surface temperature reaches 80 degrees. The hotter the water and the air above, the more moisture and heat energy a storm can pull from.

If our Earth warms so wil the ocean surface temperature, this could lead directly to more frequent and more powerful hurricanes, cyclones, and typhoons on a global scale. Was Katrina and the whole 2005 hurricane season evidence of this already occurring? The Friend's of Science say hell no, anyone with a brain would say, it's certainly possible and a plausible threat.

Let's just hope the Friends of Science folks are right on this one. I'll still fight my way toward sustainable living just in case they're wrong. 

Common misconceptions about global warming - [Friends of Science]

A quieter and almost twice as efficient wind turbine may be just what the wind power industry needs. Stormblade Ltd. an engineering company based out of London has designed this power plant that can accelerate the air before it reaches the blades which will increase efficiency in both low and high wind conditions. No word yet on if or when it will go into mass production.

Stormblade Turbine is More Efficient, Quietly Neighbor-Friendly - [Engineer Live via Gizmodo]