Thursday, August 31, 2006

Global Warming Spurs Ocean Methane Release

Here's another one of those positive feedback situations. Global warming increases oceanic oil seeps, which release more methane, which is a strong greenhouse gas.

Scientific American.com: Global Warming Spurs Ocean Methane Release

Ocean plankton absorb less CO2

Less of a carbon sink than the models had calculated, due to lowered iron cocentrations. What's causing that isn't clear.

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Ocean plankton absorb less CO2

Study: Summer is Getting Longer - Yahoo! News

Thought it was just your imagination? well, no, not really.

Study: Summer is Getting Longer - Yahoo! News

California takes lead in U.S. global warming fight - Yahoo! News

Once more California seems to be a different nation than the one centered in Washington DC. Fortunately, it's such a large market that its regulations and requirements affect products all through the country, both directly and as a pace-setter.

California takes lead in U.S. global warming fight - Yahoo! News

Monday, August 28, 2006

Thursday, August 24, 2006

McKibben on Global Warming

Bill McKibben, who had a book about twenty years ago called "The End of Nature", which presciently pointed out that given human effects on the entire body of the atmosphere, there were no truly natural, that is, untouched, places on the planet. This is another call for action.

Finally, Fired up over Global Warming

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Insurance Industry faces climate change

I ran into this on a another climate blog. It's interesting that they are facing the risks as a category, rather than trying to factor the climate change effects into the other categories of risk where a lot of the trouble is expressed. Parsing the damages by category is always a crap shoot with insurance coverage. On the gulf coast a policy would cover the wind taking a roof off, but not the wind driving a storm surge flood.

Plugged in: Insurance companies grapple with global warming - Aug. 23, 2006

Wednesday, August 16, 2006

Simple arguments for why climate can be predicted

Some folks are puzzled by the apparent contradiction between the inability to predict short term weather (beyond a few days), and the modeling of longer term climate change, which grows more accurate as the models are fine tuned. This post on Real Cimate addresses some of the reasons that this contradiction is only apparent, and why the two projects are critters of different kinds.

RealClimate » Short and simple arguments for why climate can be predicted

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

Three degree warming prediction

The consequences of this amount of warming are spelled out

The Heat Is Online

Saturday, August 12, 2006

Triple dose of morbidity

I found it strange that these three stories came up on AP science at the same time.

First, dying Aspens

Then the Pacific dead zone growing

And then mysterious die-offs of Salt Marsh vegetation

I'm not sure that they are all caused by globalwarming, though I suspect that it is at last a stressor on most systems.

Greenland's Ice Melting is a Fright

This is getting published in Science today, and seems to be new and more alarming result.

Greenland's Ice Cap is Melting at a Frighteningly Fast Rate

Saturday, August 05, 2006

The Canary Project

Here is a site with before and after photos of areas being affected by Global Warming

The Canary Project

The Climate Group

Link

Website for this "independent, nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing business and government leadership on climate change. ... based in the UK, the USA and Australia." Features interviews with international business and government leaders, case studies about actions being taken by governmental and corporate actors "to minimize their carbon footprints," and suggestions for individuals for reducing emissions (with links to related sites). Also includes links to news stories, online publications, and more.

RealClimate » Amazonian drought

Since I posted an alarming article on this drought, it's probably good that a more complete and scientifically level-headed evaluation follow. Please check this out. I still have visions of more forest fires as the heat continues to build, and the tropics aren't as adapted to occasional catastrophic fire as the more northern fire regimes. More info can be chased down by Googling Stephen J Pyne

RealClimate » Amazonian drought

Friday, August 04, 2006