Meltdown!

[fluffy666]

There goes the Arctic Sea ice.... With, possible, quite serious implications for our weather - replacing a consistent sheet of ice with seasonal ocean is unlikely to be consequence-free.

More info, it's still at least 2 weeks to the end of the melt season, and most records have been blown away..

The last time we saw these extremes was in 2007 - indeed iut's generally the 2007 records that are being broken. Except that 2007 had freak weather that persisted through most of the melting season, and ended with a solid area of compacted, solid sea ice. This year, weather has been neutral for melting; and there is barely any area of contiguous ice left.

(Hmmm.. catastrophic sea ice loss, catastrophic heat waves, catastrophic UK summers, no, must not make connections..)

[Guest eight]

(Hmmm.. catastrophic sea ice loss, catastrophic heat waves, catastrophic UK summers, no, must not make connections..)

Politicians say "More taxes will solve everything"

And the band played on......

[libspero]

Define "catastrophic UK summers" and how they will be worse than the ones we currently have

[fluffy666]

Politicians say "More taxes will solve everything"

And the band played on......

Don't worry about any action being taken to stop this - meaningful action anyway - in many ways the Denialist campaign has won. On a global level, the only thing restraining fossil fuel consumption is the difficulty getting it out of the ground fast enough.. measures like wind farms and solar PV manage to look like action whilst providing no threat whatsoever to the fossil fuel industry, whilst technologies that might actually make a difference, such as various flavours of fast and breeder nuclear reactors, are not even discussed.

Oh, and wouldn't need extra taxes, just perhaps 1/3 of current military spending for 20 years..

[swissy_fit]

Action will be taken when the rising waters threaten a major city with a majority of white inhabitants, not before.

[Nuggets Mahoney]

(Hmmm.. catastrophic sea ice loss, catastrophic heat waves, catastrophic UK summers, no, must not make connections..)

So, if it we have a heatwave in the UK and it p1sses down in the States next year that would prove 'the denialists' case?

Whilst we're at it, what kind of winter can we expect in the N. Hemisphere this year?

[fluffy666]

Define "catastrophic UK summers" and how they will be worse than the ones we currently have

The hypothesis is:

- Increased open ocean at the Arctic absorbs more heat, and couples more strongly with the Atmopsphere

- This disrupts the Arctic jet stream, and

- This causes bigger and slower Rossby waves that cause NH weather to get stuck into patterns; in this case the UK gets an awful summer with continuous rain, but the US and Southern Europe get huge heatwaves.

- And of course if it gets stuck the opposite way in winter we get snow and freezing temperatures.

Of course, this being at the interface of weather and climate, firm predictions are not a good idea. Indeed, I'm tempted to predict a bad summer next year just so that the weather turns around and kicks my backside on the subject.

[fluffy666]

So, if it we have a heatwave in the UK and it p1sses down in the States next year that would prove 'the denialists' case?

First, this is all at the hypothesis stage.. when talking about medium scale events on timescales of months to a year, proof is a luxury..

BUT.. if we had a record heatwave in the UK and continuous rain in the US it would agree with the hypothesis. However, if we had a run of generally average weather worldwide for a few years if would be evidence against the hypothesis.

Whilst we're at it, what kind of winter can we expect in the N. Hemisphere this year?

Cold. Or Warm. Or Average. Tell you in February.

[Nuggets Mahoney]

Of course, this being at the interface of weather and climate, firm predictions are not a good idea. Indeed, I'm tempted to predict a bad summer next year just so that the weather turns around and kicks my backside on the subject.

Assuming for a second the hypothesis is sound, unless the Western system of governance is changed any funds raised for remedial measures would get spanked and spirited away. The Chinese would probably press on with their own development regardless.

The impact of war is much more immediate and less hypothetical than the global warming thing and that continues to be an immensely popular pastime.

Back to the hypothesis / theory, if it were mine I'd be looking to make some falsifiable statements that put it beyond critics being able to respond 'we've had droughts and deluges before fossil fuels'.

[Goat]

Don't worry about any action being taken to stop this - meaningful action anyway - in many ways the Denialist campaign has won. On a global level, the only thing restraining fossil fuel consumption is the difficulty getting it out of the ground fast enough.. measures like wind farms and solar PV manage to look like action whilst providing no threat whatsoever to the fossil fuel industry, whilst technologies that might actually make a difference, such as various flavours of fast and breeder nuclear reactors, are not even discussed.

Agreed in principal but I'm not sure that "denialists" or the FF industry is really to blame.

I think there are 2 more likely targets:

1. Ecomentalist fundamentalists who are opposed to energy per se as a matter of religious faith but will tollerate "renewables" until such time as we can live in harmony with nature.

2. Rent seekers in the wind/solar industry (Tim Yeo e.g.)

who for differing reasons have shifted the argument away from technologies that might work and onto fantasies about how renewables can replace FF and low energy lightbulbs can save the world.

Logically the ideal outcome for the FF industry would be to find a cheap and workable engineering solution that allowed them to carry on in business without having to worry about the CO2 end result.

Oh, and wouldn't need extra taxes, just perhaps 1/3 of current military spending for 20 years..

Not much then.

Although you'd probably be able to pay it out of what you save on wind/solar subsidies and other green measures.

[fluffy666]

Assuming for a second the hypothesis is sound, unless the Western system of governance is changed any funds raised for remedial measures would get spanked and spirited away. The Chinese would probably press on with their own development regardless.

The impact of war is much more immediate and less hypothetical than the global warming thing and that continues to be an immensely popular pastime.

We haven't had a proper war since 1982.. (according to my definition of a proper war...) I could also point out that if the west reduced oil use to the point where we didn't need oil imports, it would suddenly change the geopolitical situation.

Back to the hypothesis / theory, if it were mine I'd be looking to make some falsifiable statements that put it beyond critics being able to respond 'we've had droughts and deluges before fossil fuels'.

http://tamino.wordpress.com/2012/08/22/is-climate-really-changing/

Specifically, the graphs relating to the Drought index and the Munich Re natural disaster count. In the latter, note that there is no discernible trend in the geophysical disaster count (i.e. Volcanoes and Earthquakes), but there is in weather/climate related stuff.

Essentially, the 'null hypothesis' is that the number of extreme weather events would be constant over time; especially over the past few decades where we have global reporting. We would expect the cost to go up regardless (more wealth to destroy, more people), so it's the number that is important to measure.

I'd also ask that you approach this stuff on the basis that the political decision has already been taken, and that that decision is 'do nothing'.

[Executive Sadman]

Go long siberian agriculture, short polar bears. More to gain from an ice free arctic than to lose IMO. Easier access to oil reserves, cheaper/quicker shipping routes.

[Nuggets Mahoney]

We haven't had a proper war since 1982.. (according to my definition of a proper war...) I could also point out that if the west reduced oil use to the point where we didn't need oil imports, it would suddenly change the geopolitical situation.

http://tamino.wordpress.com/2012/08/22/is-climate-really-changing/

Specifically, the graphs relating to the Drought index and the Munich Re natural disaster count. In the latter, note that there is no discernible trend in the geophysical disaster count (i.e. Volcanoes and Earthquakes), but there is in weather/climate related stuff.

Essentially, the 'null hypothesis' is that the number of extreme weather events would be constant over time; especially over the past few decades where we have global reporting. We would expect the cost to go up regardless (more wealth to destroy, more people), so it's the number that is important to measure.

I'd also ask that you approach this stuff on the basis that the political decision has already been taken, and that that decision is 'do nothing'.

I think we may have touched on this before but if I became world dictator tomorrow there'd be solar panels stuck to any remotely viable surface, water wheels, permaculture gardens on the roofs of office blocks, the works.

I'd also encourage people to stop building in marginal locations.

I may have also mentioned this before but I've lived in New Orleans and Christchurch (NZ) shortly before they both got creamed. I've sat on first floor verandahs in NO watching freighters cruise by above me and in houses in Christchurch nailed to cliff faces. Someone mentioned Naples in a thread the other day. Very few people there seem the least bit concerned that, very possibly within the span of a human lifetime, the volcano next door is going to dump all over the houses they've been building.

The West Coast of the US. How's that going to fare when the Big One finally hits?

We can all debate whether or not humans have a decisive impact on catastrophic climate change till the cows come home. People will press on with their devil may care attitude to risk and consequences, regardless of the outcome of that debate.

The only political system that can deliver the kind of decision you might like would be a totalitarian one. And that's just as likely to balls things up at some point as save humanity from itself (edit: actually, more likely if you believe power has a tendency to corrupt).

[Bloo Loo]

The hypothesis is:

- Increased open ocean at the Arctic absorbs more heat, and couples more strongly with the Atmopsphere

- This disrupts the Arctic jet stream, and

- This causes bigger and slower Rossby waves that cause NH weather to get stuck into patterns; in this case the UK gets an awful summer with continuous rain, but the US and Southern Europe get huge heatwaves.

- And of course if it gets stuck the opposite way in winter we get snow and freezing temperatures.

Of course, this being at the interface of weather and climate, firm predictions are not a good idea. Indeed, I'm tempted to predict a bad summer next year just so that the weather turns around and kicks my backside on the subject.

any news on the contra conditions on the South Pole?

[fluffy666]

any news on the contra conditions on the South Pole?

Small positive anomaly (not entirely unexpected either)

Out of interest, why do you think that it's important?

[Bloo Loo]

Small positive anomaly (not entirely unexpected either)

Out of interest, why do you think that it's important?

the planet is a whole.

one side warms, the other side cools.

[rxe]

I don't buy the graphs of sea level rising, because the visible eviidence suggests otherwise. I have a photographic record of a chunk of beach in Spain going back close to 60 years. There is no difference at all in the levels, but the graphs suggest a 100mm plus delta. Yes it is the med, but if th Atlantic was 100 mm higher, the med would be as well.

On the damage due to climate events, that is largely because there are more of us to notice, and more reporting of the disasters. If no one is there to be affected, and/or no one reported it, then it won't be on the graph. 100 years ago, some shacks on a beach might get taken out by a hurricane - not a biggie, the owners knew this was likely, thats why they built shacks. Modern man plonks a £2m beachfront mansion on there, and gets all upset when it gets twatted.

[Nuggets Mahoney]

I don't buy the graphs of sea level rising, because the visible eviidence suggests otherwise. I have a photographic record of a chunk of beach in Spain going back close to 60 years. There is no difference at all in the levels, but the graphs suggest a 100mm plus delta. Yes it is the med, but if th Atlantic was 100 mm higher, the med would be as well.

Not necessarily. Sea Level is quite lumpy around the world and is subject to (differences in) gravity, winds, temperatures, all sorts. Another complicating factor is that continents sort of bob up and down, depending on what's been sitting on them

There is a chap frequently cited by baby-eating 'denialists' called Nils-Axel Mörner who does claim that sea levels are basically static.

Which I would find surprising, given that the natural world doesn't really do static.

'Warmonger' response to Mörner here...

Nils-Axel Mörner is Wrong About Sea Level Rise

[Guest eight]

On the damage due to climate events, that is largely because there are more of us to notice, and more reporting of the disasters. If no one is there to be affected, and/or no one reported it, then it won't be on the graph. 100 years ago, some shacks on a beach might get taken out by a hurricane - not a biggie, the owners knew this was likely, thats why they built shacks. Modern man plonks a £2m beachfront mansion on there, and gets all upset when it gets twatted.

So these are economic events rather than environmental ones?

[(Blizzard)]

...

Back to the hypothesis / theory, if it were mine I'd be looking to make some falsifiable statements that put it beyond critics being able to respond 'we've had droughts and deluges before fossil fuels'.

It is already beyond the critics ability to respond.

[sleepwello'nights]

Go long siberian agriculture, short polar bears. More to gain from an ice free arctic than to lose IMO. Easier access to oil reserves, cheaper/quicker shipping routes.

I caught the tail end of a program a couple of nights ago refuting some of the claims made by Al Gore in an inconvenient truth. One of the points I saw was that although there is ice melt in polar regions causing a reduction of the ice field around the land mass when the total area was viewed there was an increase in the ice field around other areas of the polar region.

The net effect was that there was no real change in the total size of the ice field.

Which scientist is correct? I have no idea. I have no way of testing any of their hypotheses, other than believing the one I intuitively consider has the more acceptable theory.

[fluffy666]

Which scientist* is correct? I have no idea. I have no way of testing any of their hypotheses, other than believing the one I intuitively consider has the more acceptable theory.

You know, the Enlightenment was just something that happened to other people, wasn't it? The idea that you should go out and look for evidence instead of relying on 'intuition'?

Maybe, for instance, you could have gone to the site originally linked:

http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/

It shows the Northern hemisphere. It shows the southern hemisphere. It even has a graph combining the two, even though there are very good reasons for considering the systems separately - the Arctic and Antarctic are very different for sea ice. One is an oceanic basin surrounded by land which used to be characterized and kept cold by multiyear sea ice, the other is an ice-covered continent surrounded by ocean, which will be kept cold by Antarctica until that melts..

*Al Gore is not a scientist.

[Bloo Loo]

snip

*Al Gore is not a scientist.

obviously...otherwise, he wouldnt be buying up beach front property.

[Guest eight]

You know, the Enlightenment was just something that happened to other people, wasn't it? The idea that you should go out and look for evidence instead of relying on 'intuition'?

Maybe, for instance, you could have gone to the site originally linked:

I wouldn't call visiting a website "looking for evidence". I would call myself going out with a ruler and measuring the sea ice myself both now, and 100 years ago, evidence. In this field I'm not prepared to take anybody else's word for anything.

[fluffy666]

I wouldn't call visiting a website "looking for evidence". I would call myself going out with a ruler and measuring the sea ice myself both now, and 100 years ago, evidence. In this field I'm not prepared to take anybody else's word for anything.

Unfortunately, the heyday of the 'Natural Philosopher' - i.e. a person who could claim to know all scientific knowledge and have personally verified much of it for himself - finished in the early 1800s.

If you've reached the stage of claiming that the satellite photos are wrong/doctored.. there isn't much that can be done. You can track down relevant websites easily - there are multiple sites using different metrics. Don't believe those, you can get raw satellite images, raw shipboard measurements.. whatever. The point is that if the will is that it is possible to get at the evidence.. whereas sleepwello'nights was basically saying that he/she was not going to bother, just go with his/her preconceptions.

That's a bit like saying, 'I heard someone say that house prices double every 7 years, I think that must be true because I want to believe it, and I'm not going to believe any sites like Rightmove, Land registry, Nationwide, Halifax, etc, they are all VIs cooking the books'