Revised Theory Suggests Carbon Dioxide Levels Already in Danger Zone

What proof is there for this conjecture other than GCMs whose runs project only hypothetical scenarios based upon hypothetical assumptionns?

My deep religious faith in global warming denialism is not shaken by this at all.

/s

Grow more plants... easy solution.

next.

Grow more plants... easy solution.

Plants only sequester carbon in so far as they build new soil; all the other CO2 is just released back to the atmosphere by the action of fungi, bacteria, mites, worms and oxidation.

Grow more plants... easy solution.

next.

pfft that would never work. You can't make money off of it.

Plants only sequester carbon in so far as they build new soil; all the other CO2 is just released back to the atmosphere by the action of fungi, bacteria, mites, worms and oxidation.

Ok. Grow more plants and then cut them down and bury them...deep...then grow more plants...

Eliminate coal? America is the Saudi Arabia of coal; how convenient. Why not simply eliminate all the industry and cars in North America, then sue China and India to support us through the UN?

Maybe they know something about climate, maybe they don't. The results aren't in on that one. But boy are they out to lunch when it comes to public policy. This doesn't even pass the sniff test. Go back to your labs and stop embarassing yourselves. The source of 50% of our electricity is not going to be replaced by unicorn farts.

fertilize the ocean w/ slow release iron salts

In the mean time, the earth's global temperatures have been declining for the past ten years, and have decreased to their 1970-80's levels in the past 2 years.

La Nina is expected to continue this winter, with resulting colder temperatures (and more deaths from cold and sickness) over most of the Northern hemisphere....

So, since global warming has stopped, what is Hansen worried about? Other than his funding and future Nobel Prize?

Well I guess the old theory wasn't working so now the IPCC has a brand new one. Temperatures are going down, but NOW Pachauri and Gore are saying the warming is accelerating. Why does anyone still believe those guys??? Look at this:

http://wattsupwit...er-rate/

There are still people who believe the world is warming. I met one today....while he was out buying a heavier jacket.

Looks like everyone here is a climate scientist. Has it ever occured to any one of you that the climatologists might be right and you might be stupid?

If they are wrong: Thank God! But what if they are right and we do nothing! The world will survive: But not us: Maybe we should again say Thank God!

And the Obaminable Knowmen come crawling fromunda their rocks.

Looks like everyone here is a climate scientist. Has it ever occured to any one of you that the climatologists might be right and you might be stupid?

Has it ever occured to you that when unfounded theories are forwarded they might be wrong?

Have you ever figured that a scientist is a person and is just as interested in money as an oil baron?

Of course we have to do something. We have to take a shovel and put money six feet under and build discotheques out of the airplanes.

Looks like everyone here is a climate scientist. Has it ever occured to any one of you that the climatologists might be right and you might be stupid?

Has it ever occured to you that when unfounded theories are forwarded they might be wrong?

Have you ever figured that a scientist is a person and is just as interested in money as an oil baron?

Why dont you go tell that to all other sections?

In the mean time, the earth's global temperatures have been declining for the past ten years, and have decreased to their 1970-80's levels in the past 2 years.

La Nina is expected to continue this winter, with resulting colder temperatures (and more deaths from cold and sickness) over most of the Northern hemisphere....

So, since global warming has stopped, what is Hansen worried about? Other than his funding and future Nobel Prize?

You forgot. Cooling is caused by warming...

Seems political, based on poor, cherry picked stats and greatly non-rigorous simulations as well as ignores the possiblity of a dangerous cooling by an inactive Sol starting now. I have followed this CO2 issue 30 years since grad school in the mid 70s when we faintly hoped it might buy a little warmth down the road in future years. I see a distinct lack of solar-terrestial interactions studied by IPCC. PS: On "warming" vs solar inactivity, I scraped 24 inches of fresh snow off my driveway at the end of last April, by far my worst April ever and it was a very cool summer...

http://members.op...ants.gif

... He he he!

yeah, me too (about the snow), but I also golfed in shorts on friday and I live in ontario....

yeah, me too (about the snow), but I also golfed in shorts on friday and I live in ontario....

Where in Ontario? Parts of it are at the same latitude as Northern California.

Velanarris, I hope you will find your heart someday, because playing around like this with the lives of many peoples at risk, can only be done from someone who has not find is own. You know very well, but contributing to hate blogs as you do is evil.

DKA,
Velanarris is a caring human being. He is not evil. He thinks differently than you do. And that is a good thing.

I am still unconvinced on the science of mad made global warming. But. If the figures are to be believed (and I believe them more than the conclusions) then we have been polluting the atmosphere for a long time.

CO2 in the atmosphere seems to have an extremely long half life, and it is our duty to curtail our pollution of this planet.

Hopefully, one day, the place can be turned into utopia. To get there though we have to start from here. Where we are at right now and the path we have taken to get here cannot be the same path we want to travel in the future, can it?

It is a good plan to look at what level of pollution we want to finish at. The only task ahead then, is to determine how we are going to get there, and how long we intend to take to get there.

So lets some researchers research. Let them determine the type of atmosphere we want to breath, let a debate take place. I am in favour of setting the aim at a clean atmosphere on a planet with plenty of green space, somewhere where you can get away from other people from time to time, without having to travel to Antarctica to do it.

How do we develop a clean, green, stress free planet and lifestyle without having to find some way to escape from the world? I for one don't want to spend my life contemplating my navel just so I don't have to look up and see smog filled skies all around.

Warming slower briefly not stopped or reversed
Re RobertACookPE statement "In the mean time, the earth's global temperatures have been declining for the past ten years, and have decreased to their 1970-80's levels in the past 2 years. "

Below is the link to a report and graph that show that statement to be untrue.
http://www.metoff...s_on.pdf

Now that is funny. The MET decided to leave the last year off the report, Mr. Petter. Now here's a graph that has all four metrics, UAH, RSS, GISS and Hadcrut on one graph, with a linear trend for each, for the last seven years:
http://scienceand...pped.pdf

"and gas reserve estimates and whether the most difficult to extract oil and gas is left in the ground" ---> higher prices for oil will drive them to use the difficult oil.

Besides climate what about our own health?? How many of you would love to live down wind from a coal plant? "Hey kids go outside and get some fresh grey air"

"and gas reserve estimates and whether the most difficult to extract oil and gas is left in the ground" ---> higher prices for oil will drive them to use the difficult oil.

Besides climate what about our own health?? How many of you would love to live down wind from a coal plant? "Hey kids go outside and get some fresh grey air"

It's not the 70's. The laws on storage and emissions have changed greatly. Coal is no longer the polluter it was.

Velanarris, I hope you will find your heart someday, because playing around like this with the lives of many peoples at risk, can only be done from someone who has not find is own. You know very well, but contributing to hate blogs as you do is evil.

I'll find my heart after you find your brain. Difference is, compassion isn't necessary to determine fraud.

MikeB,
Its worth the pro AGW (or all of us) reading the whole of that link.

yeah, me too (about the snow), but I also golfed in shorts on friday and I live in ontario....

Isn't Ontario around LA? Where do you live? Up in the Grapevine?

If they are wrong: Thank God! But what if they are right and we do nothing! The world will survive: But not us: Maybe we should again say Thank God!

what if they are wrong and we do manage to drop global temperatures? Kind of a connundrum.

Velanarris, I hope you will find your heart someday, because playing around like this with the lives of many peoples at risk, can only be done from someone who has not find is own. You know very well, but contributing to hate blogs as you do is evil.

I don't agree with this. He is constantly rejecting any argument what so ever, any, all, nothing is good enough for him. However the arguments that he comes up with are odd (like the earth quakes theory). If he would be consistant and be as critical on both side, I would think he has a heart and cares about human being, but he is very very far from that. He is 100% biased, so much that this is past common sense, it has become emotional and selfish, unkind to only want to see what is a direction against one where lives, in the end, are at play.

so let me get som important facts right if we concider the 2ppm per year and the current of 385PPM versus the 350ppm ideal then we've been polluting for the past 17.5 years?

Or maybe the number ramped up but even then it'd be hard to stretch back to the begining of the industrial revolution. Maybe the numbers are right and the original pre industrial number was closer to 180ppm. Then we're all screwed because we'd starve all the trees at some point plus as against acid rain as I am, a certain acidity to rainwater is neccisary for soil life.

Has anyone looked at the abstract, here are some gems:

"Decreasing CO2 was the main cause of a cooling trend that began 50 million years ago, the planet being nearly ice-free until CO2 fell to 450 ± 100 ppm" plus or minus 25% are you kidding me?

"there is a possibility of seeding irreversible catastrophic effects." "Equilibrium sensitivity, including slower surface albedo feedbacks, is %u223C6°C for doubled CO2 for the range of climate states between glacial conditions and ice-free Antarctica. Decreasing CO2 was the main cause of a cooling trend that began 50 million years ago, the planet being nearly ice-free until CO2 fell to 450 ± 100 ppm"
hmm, irreversably repeat previous climate changes that reversed? If we've been to 550 and didn't dy, then why is 385 a scary number now?

They cite 200PPM swings, but 50PPM will kill us all? This isn't even good science fiction.

Velanarris, I hope you will find your heart someday, because playing around like this with the lives of many peoples at risk, can only be done from someone who has not find is own. You know very well, but contributing to hate blogs as you do is evil.

I don't agree with this. He is constantly rejecting any argument what so ever, any, all, nothing is good enough for him. However the arguments that he comes up with are odd (like the earth quakes theory). If he would be consistant and be as critical on both side, I would think he has a heart and cares about human being, but he is very very far from that. He is 100% biased, so much that this is past common sense, it has become emotional and selfish, unkind to only want to see what is a direction against one where lives, in the end, are at play.

http://video.goog...36508883

Velanarris, I hope you will find your heart someday, because playing around like this with the lives of many peoples at risk, can only be done from someone who has not find is own. You know very well, but contributing to hate blogs as you do is evil.

I don't agree with this. He is constantly rejecting any argument what so ever, any, all, nothing is good enough for him. However the arguments that he comes up with are odd (like the earth quakes theory). If he would be consistant and be as critical on both side, I would think he has a heart and cares about human being, but he is very very far from that. He is 100% biased, so much that this is past common sense, it has become emotional and selfish, unkind to only want to see what is a direction against one where lives, in the end, are at play.

http://video.goog...36508883

Pay special attention starting from 13:30 until 16:00.

So where has it been proven that man's CO2 emissions cause global warming?Where is said global warming currently, either natural or anthropogenic? Correlation does not imply causation. A studies initial assumptions determine its conclusion.Will all this ice melt quickly ,like in a year or two or will it take a Century?
By the way, who says the planet is at its optimum temperature and ice levels, etc.Or were the best conditions 10 years ago? Oh, that would be 1998, it's cooler now. Or was it 1988 when Hansen had his performance in Congress? And just where is all this CO2 coming from? Does Henry's law still apply? Besides changes in CO2 levels lag temperature changes.The average Ph of the oceans is about 8.1, so just how much CO2 is needed to bring the oceans below a Ph of 7?
Finally, is it true more taxpayer money is spent on "global warming" research than Cancer research? That would be a very interesting fact indeed!

what if they are wrong and we do manage to drop global temperatures? Kind of a connundrum.

If they are wrong: Thank God! But what if they are right and we do nothing! The world will survive: But not us: Maybe we should again say Thank God!

what if they are wrong and we do manage to drop global temperatures? Kind of a connundrum.

You do have a point. Even if we do something we might in addition have volcanoes errupting etc. On the other hand species survive if they do not overtax the eco-system. Thus if you excrete more than your surroundings can rework and renew you are bound to end up in trouble. We have lived for the past 200 years as if the world's resources are unlimited and if it can absorb all the excrement we throw at it. It definitely worries me.

They cite 200PPM swings, but 50PPM will kill us all? This isn't even good science fiction.

They are also ignoring the role played by the oceans as a sink for CO2 and a thermal reservoir.

If we want to maintain levels of CO2 at lower levels than it is now it will be expensive.

But, how do we know that CO2 at lower levels than now is better? For much of earths history CO2 has been higher than now.

Sure the world has been getting warmer and may now be getting cooler.

We are polluting the world - much of it is particulate which causes cloud cover and thus has a cooling effect.

We are building cities which creates localized heating and also changes the local precipitation.

We are cutting down forests and creating agriculture or suburban sprawls. These things are not fixed by concentrating on global warming.

Lets solve some of the most pressing problems, most are social like starvation and disease, some are Green like deforestation, extinction.

We are cutting down forests and creating agriculture or suburban sprawls. These things are not fixed by concentrating on global warming.

Lets solve some of the most pressing problems, most are social like starvation and disease, some are Green like deforestation, extinction.

Actually, the amount of forestation in the contiguous 48 states has risen in recent decades and is now higher than it was in the 1920s.
http://www.pnas.o...full.pdf html

We are cutting down forests and creating agriculture or suburban sprawls. These things are not fixed by concentrating on global warming.

Lets solve some of the most pressing problems, most are social like starvation and disease, some are Green like deforestation, extinction.

Actually, the amount of forestation in the contiguous 48 states has risen in recent decades and is now higher than it was in the 1920s.
http://www.pnas.o...full.pdf html

According to the former head and founder of Greenpeaced we now sit on a greater reserve of natural forests than the country had prior to colonization, due to our agriculture and irrigation efforts I agree.

California was a desert for the most part, now there are areas of Cali that are majestic forests. Bring the logging industry back, it'd fix half of our economic problems, all of our housing problems, and a lot of our environmental problems (at least the ones that think CO2 is responsible).

And lets not forget that Al Gore was opposed to the US Senate ratifying the Kyoto Protocol.

We all should know by now that the best way to pass bad science is with great media! The most extravagant lies can be psycho-laundered by authoritative repetition by the most trusted names you know. Pretty soon the obedient masses will start repeating the mantras on cue and the people will begin to enforce the lies themselves through peer pressure and popular communication.

Look how successful this was in in Germany and the USSR - at least until the massive backlog of reality burst through the psychobabble dams they built.

ok so now the argument becomes whether or not global warming is real. Hum , I was raised in the east of England and in the summers of the '60s and early '70s if the temperature got to 80F we were shocked such things were unusual. when last in London in the summer of '99 we had several days of 100F temperatures up to 104F. Sorry ,to me that is kind of convincing to a layman that maybe global warming is real. In high school in the '60s were discussed the possible results of releasing in a couple of hundred years the carbon laid down over millions from fossil fuels. global warming through the greenhouse effects was one of the theories proposed.

ok so now the argument becomes whether or not global warming is real. Hum , I was raised in the east of England and in the summers of the '60s and early '70s if the temperature got to 80F we were shocked such things were unusual. when last in London in the summer of '99 we had several days of 100F temperatures up to 104F. Sorry ,to me that is kind of convincing to a layman that maybe global warming is real. In high school in the '60s were discussed the possible results of releasing in a couple of hundred years the carbon laid down over millions from fossil fuels. global warming through the greenhouse effects was one of the theories proposed.

Go to your local library and check the newspaper for the past century. Not all of them of course but pick a specific date and check the temperature for every year from 1900-2000 and tell me if you see a trend.

I'm pretty sure the trend you'll find, when graphed, will look exactly like a sine wave.
I know this, because I did it.

There are many historical periods in the past 1500 years that indicate large climate swings, both warm and cold. None of these events were precipitated by any human activity, humans simply accepted them as part of nature and adapted.

Climate change is real, it will forever be a part of the human experience and the best way to approach it is with calm, rational, intelligent adaptation.

I suspect what offends most people is the strain to impose a sense of immediate crisis and emergency upon a phenomenon that is quite natural and has been ongoing forever.

Further negativity is generated when certain interest groups try to hijack the social response to climate change and force it to their own ideologies and political aspirations.

Szkeptik - how come all this "not a climatologist so stfu" doesn't apply to Al Gore?

RAL - Al Gore is the other end of the spectrum. He's overreacting for his own political reasons. I do think it's good to frighten the population a bit so they take it more seriously, but on the scientific level I don't think Al Gore has any grounds to argue on.

I do think it's good to frighten the population a bit so they take it more seriously,

So terrorism for the sake of conversation?

Sounds rather misguided to me.

It's not terrorism to tell the people about the worst possible outcome. If there is a real possibility of it happening, than it's merely stating facts.

It's not terrorism to tell the people about the worst possible outcome. If there is a real possibility of it happening, than it's merely stating facts.

But when those facts are false, and you continue to cite excessive alarm it's the same thing as yelling FIRE inside a crowded theater.

They might not see the flames or smoke, but someone is getting trampled to death. Perhaps terrorism is too harsh a word but, it's not that far off.

"But when those facts are false..."
Please don't start with that. Climate change is not like astrology. The specialists in that field all agree that it's happening.

I also don't think that the Earth ending up looking like Venus is a probable outcome, but as long as the possibility is there, however remote everyone has the right to know that their grandchildren just might get roasted because of them.

Please don't start with that. Climate change is not like astrology. The specialists in that field all agree that it's happening.

Yes but they do not agree as to the cause meaning the science is not settled and there is no concensus.

In the field of climatology there would be only one constant. That constant is change.

but as long as the possibility is there, however remote everyone has the right to know that their grandchildren just might get roasted because of them.

The possibility is not there. We cannot absorb anywhere near the sun's energy that Venus does without changing the orbit of the planet. The differences between Earth and Venus are so numerous that a comparision other than in the most general of terms isn't logical.

Please do some googleing about methane in the ocean floors.

Please do some googleing about methane in the ocean floors.

Please understand the concentrations and volumes at play as well as the reponses of aqueous methane hydrate under several atmospheres of pressure at depth.

I was reading about some scholars that died of Malaria they got from mosquitoes breeding in the Thams River in London.

This was several hundred years ago and the climate has still not warmed back up to that level yet. But it may happen soon. And if it does will it have anything to do with Man produced CO2?