Ruth
The Living Force
I would like to recommend this book:
We Are The Weather Makers – The Story of Global Warming
By Tim Flannery (2006)
The Text Publishing Company, 22 William Street Melbourne, Victoria, 3000
Australia
http://www.textpublishing.com.au/
This book was written by a palaeontologist and explains in simple language the connecting factors making up global warming and their relationship to each other. He talks about thresholds, change gateways what drives climate change on this planet and from space as well as extinction. I haven’t covered all the things mentioned in the book, but I was impressed by the number of things that were discussed. Global warming is definitely happening and so is climate change in all its various forms. The question is: Can we prevent triggering the three potential tripping points to global cataclysm?
The Importance of Atmosphere and CO2
Although CO2 has made up only 3 parts per 10,000 in our atmosphere and has done for the past 10,000 years, small changes in its levels have dramatic effects on global temperature. As an example; if this gas was to make up 1% of our atmosphere, it is estimated that our planetary surface temperature would rise to 100 degrees celsius. Venus, with its atmosphere of 98% CO2 has a surface temperature of 477 degrees celsius. Carbon Dioxide is the one of the main greenhouse gases involved in climate change.
Evolution and the Carbon cycle
For nearly half of this planets existence the earth’s atmosphere would have been deadly to creatures of our size, indeed anything bigger than a microbe would not have lived. Around 600 million years ago, the Earth underwent four very severe ice ages aided by a powerful mechanism called Albedo. This mechanism is where white surfaces (such as snow and ice) reflect 80-90% of the suns light, once a certain portion of the Earths surface is covered it sends the Earth into deep freeze for millions of years. It was around this time that the oxygen in the earth’s atmosphere started to permit the evolution of larger creatures. These creatures started to take part in the carbon cycle and began excreting CO2 into the atmosphere, ever since then, ice ages have been rare with only two occurring. One was between 355 and 280 million years ago and one now; for the past 33 million years.
What Explains the Ice Ages?
Atmosphere isn’t the only thing to influence this planets temperature. In 1941 a man called Milutin Milankovich published a paper that identified three main cycles involved in temperature change on our planet. He was attempting to explain what caused ice ages.
The first and longest of these cycles is the 100,000 year cycle known as Earths Eccentricity and has to do with the fact that the Earths orbit around the sun is not circular, but elliptical. This meant that the planet is carried both closer and father away from the sun, so the intensity of the suns radiation can vary. At present, the Earths orbit is fairly circular, so the difference in radiation reaching the Earth between January and July is just 6%. At more elliptical times, this difference can be as high as 20-30%.
The second cycle is the 42,000 one that concerns the tilt of the Earth on its axis. This varies from 21.8 to 24.4 degrees and determines where most of the suns radiation will fall. At the moment the Earth appears to be in the middle range.
The third and shortest of cycles runs for 22,000 years and concerns the wobble of the Earth on it’s axis. The axis shifts from pointing to the Pole Star, to pointing to Vega. When it does this it effects the intensity of the seasons. When Vega marks true North winters turn bitterly cold and summers scorchingly hot.
According to these measures we should currently be experiencing all the conditions of an ice age. But we are not. During the last 8 thousand years we have experienced what has been called a ‘Long Summer’. It is theorized that the activities of man on the environment (farming and cutting down trees) has had a lot to do with this temperature stability. A rise in CO2 in the atmosphere has kept the climate stable. We are now faced with ever increasing amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution (1800s), but most especially since the 1950 when we started to ‘liberate’ huge amounts of it into the air with the burning of fossil fuels. That relative stability we had is now no longer there.
The Greenhouse Gas Hit Parade
It has been calculated (and widely acknowledged) that a quantity of 450-550 parts per million of CO2 in the atmosphere will trigger disastrous changes. Prior to 1800 (the Industrial Revolution), there were 280 parts per million in the atmosphere. Today this figure is 380 (it was measured at 315 in 1958). It takes a long time for this carbon to recycle out of the Earths atmosphere and this is dependant not only on a reduction of CO2 emissions, but other creatures abilities to transform it back into carbon compounds.
Methane is the next most important greenhouse gas after CO2. Methane is created by microbes that live in oxygenless environments such as stagnant pools and bowels. Making up just 1.5 parts per million of the atmosphere, its concentration has doubled over the last few hundred years. It is 60 times more potent at capturing heat energy than CO2, but thankfully lasts less time in the atmosphere. It has been estimated that methane will cause 15-17% of global warming this century. Mammals produce quite large quantities of this, the majority of which tends to get trapped by ice crystals at the bottom of the ocean and remains there unless the sea temperature changes or the pressure changes. The consequence of this being ‘liberated’ on a large scale is absolutely catastrophic.
Nitrous oxide (laughing gas) is 270 times more efficient at trapping heat than CO2 and last 150 years in the atmosphere. Today there is 20% more nitrous oxide in the atmosphere than there was at the beginning of the Industrial revolution. This is mainly due to the burning of fossil fuels and the increased use of nitrogenous fertilizers by farmers.
Hydroflurocarbons (HFC) and Chloroflurocarbons (CFC). Man made ingenuity! These gases are ten thousand times more potent at capturing heat energy than CO2 and they last in the atmosphere for many centuries. Mainly responsible for destroying ozone and creating a hole in that protective layer.
Earthly Participants in Climate Change
Everybody has probably heard of the Gulf Stream which flows from the Gulf of Mexico, carrying heat with it, north, to Europe. If this gets interrupted, slows or even stops, which has happened in the past, Europe ceases to be warmed and a new ice age starts. Central France will ends up feeling a lot like Siberia. This Gulf Stream interruption is caused when large amounts of fresh water enters it, as it would when global warming occurs and the polar ice melts.
El Nino: This cycle brings extreme climatic changes often causing two thirds of the planet to be subjected to droughts, flood and other extreme weather. As greenhouse gases build up in the atmosphere we will experience persistent El Nino like conditions.
“Climate scientists are now debating whether humans have already tripped the switch that will create an ice-free Earth. If so, we have already committed our planet and ourselves to a rise in sea level of around sixty seven meters.ᾠ (p.141). This will mean that cities, towns and villages are going to disappear under water, starting in our lifetimes.
Three Major Tripping Points
Scenario 1:
“In 2003 the Pentagon commissioned a report outlining the implications for US national security should the Gulf Stream collapse.ᾠ Well, apart from the ‘shit hitting the fan’ in all sorts of ways, economically, politically and socially, scientists are now trying to understand its consequences on biological productivity in the North Atlantic ocean. How does a fall by 50% sound? With a global reduction in oceanic productivity of 20%? The Pentagon wasn’t very optimistic about man’s ability to co-operate during this crisis.
“It is possible, if the Gulf Stream were to slow, that extreme falls in temperature could be felt over Europe and North America within a couple of wintersᾠ. (p.181)
Scenario 2:
The collapse of the Amazon rainforests also represents a huge potential problem for global warming, setting up a positive feedback mechanism that would increase CO2 in the atmosphere to 1000 parts per million and turn forests into deserts. According to current modeling we should see this start to happen in 2040.
Scenario 3:
Methane release from the sea floor. The biggest extinction ever to occur (so far) was 245 million years ago when 9 out of 10 animals died. Palaentologists are starting to suspect that methane released from the sea floor had something to do with it. All that would be required would be for the pressure on it to be relieved or the sea temperature of the deep or Arctic oceans to increase.
What is the solution?
Stop or reduce the use of fossil fuels. Start using other forms of energy. And interestingly enough: “If aircraft were to fly lower, cirrus cloud formation could be cut in half and CO2 emissions lowered by 4%, while average flight times over Europe would vary by less than a minuteᾠ(p.248)
The author says “If everyone takes action to rid atmospheric carbon emissions from their lives, I believe we can stabilize and then save the Arctic and Antarctic. We could save around four out of every five species currently under threat, limit the extent of extreme weather events and reduce, almost to zero, the possibility of any of the three great disasters occurring this century, especially the collapse of the Gulf Stream and the destruction of the Amazon.ᾠ (p249)
I don’t believe the chances of this are very good. We need world leaders to start looking at this situation as the very real threat it is, rather than being caught up in their short term fantasies of money making and war mongering. The only thing that could possibly save the climate, in my opinion is some sort of massive reduction in human population. I guess doesn’t make me an optimist.
I thoroughly recommend this book for an easy to understand scientific view of global warming, its consequences and causes. Climate change isn’t something new and because it hasn’t happened significantly in the last 8 thousand years; we tend to forget that it is already happening now and the world may be a very different place within as many as eighty years.
We Are The Weather Makers – The Story of Global Warming
By Tim Flannery (2006)
The Text Publishing Company, 22 William Street Melbourne, Victoria, 3000
Australia
http://www.textpublishing.com.au/
This book was written by a palaeontologist and explains in simple language the connecting factors making up global warming and their relationship to each other. He talks about thresholds, change gateways what drives climate change on this planet and from space as well as extinction. I haven’t covered all the things mentioned in the book, but I was impressed by the number of things that were discussed. Global warming is definitely happening and so is climate change in all its various forms. The question is: Can we prevent triggering the three potential tripping points to global cataclysm?
The Importance of Atmosphere and CO2
Although CO2 has made up only 3 parts per 10,000 in our atmosphere and has done for the past 10,000 years, small changes in its levels have dramatic effects on global temperature. As an example; if this gas was to make up 1% of our atmosphere, it is estimated that our planetary surface temperature would rise to 100 degrees celsius. Venus, with its atmosphere of 98% CO2 has a surface temperature of 477 degrees celsius. Carbon Dioxide is the one of the main greenhouse gases involved in climate change.
Evolution and the Carbon cycle
For nearly half of this planets existence the earth’s atmosphere would have been deadly to creatures of our size, indeed anything bigger than a microbe would not have lived. Around 600 million years ago, the Earth underwent four very severe ice ages aided by a powerful mechanism called Albedo. This mechanism is where white surfaces (such as snow and ice) reflect 80-90% of the suns light, once a certain portion of the Earths surface is covered it sends the Earth into deep freeze for millions of years. It was around this time that the oxygen in the earth’s atmosphere started to permit the evolution of larger creatures. These creatures started to take part in the carbon cycle and began excreting CO2 into the atmosphere, ever since then, ice ages have been rare with only two occurring. One was between 355 and 280 million years ago and one now; for the past 33 million years.
What Explains the Ice Ages?
Atmosphere isn’t the only thing to influence this planets temperature. In 1941 a man called Milutin Milankovich published a paper that identified three main cycles involved in temperature change on our planet. He was attempting to explain what caused ice ages.
The first and longest of these cycles is the 100,000 year cycle known as Earths Eccentricity and has to do with the fact that the Earths orbit around the sun is not circular, but elliptical. This meant that the planet is carried both closer and father away from the sun, so the intensity of the suns radiation can vary. At present, the Earths orbit is fairly circular, so the difference in radiation reaching the Earth between January and July is just 6%. At more elliptical times, this difference can be as high as 20-30%.
The second cycle is the 42,000 one that concerns the tilt of the Earth on its axis. This varies from 21.8 to 24.4 degrees and determines where most of the suns radiation will fall. At the moment the Earth appears to be in the middle range.
The third and shortest of cycles runs for 22,000 years and concerns the wobble of the Earth on it’s axis. The axis shifts from pointing to the Pole Star, to pointing to Vega. When it does this it effects the intensity of the seasons. When Vega marks true North winters turn bitterly cold and summers scorchingly hot.
According to these measures we should currently be experiencing all the conditions of an ice age. But we are not. During the last 8 thousand years we have experienced what has been called a ‘Long Summer’. It is theorized that the activities of man on the environment (farming and cutting down trees) has had a lot to do with this temperature stability. A rise in CO2 in the atmosphere has kept the climate stable. We are now faced with ever increasing amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution (1800s), but most especially since the 1950 when we started to ‘liberate’ huge amounts of it into the air with the burning of fossil fuels. That relative stability we had is now no longer there.
The Greenhouse Gas Hit Parade
It has been calculated (and widely acknowledged) that a quantity of 450-550 parts per million of CO2 in the atmosphere will trigger disastrous changes. Prior to 1800 (the Industrial Revolution), there were 280 parts per million in the atmosphere. Today this figure is 380 (it was measured at 315 in 1958). It takes a long time for this carbon to recycle out of the Earths atmosphere and this is dependant not only on a reduction of CO2 emissions, but other creatures abilities to transform it back into carbon compounds.
Methane is the next most important greenhouse gas after CO2. Methane is created by microbes that live in oxygenless environments such as stagnant pools and bowels. Making up just 1.5 parts per million of the atmosphere, its concentration has doubled over the last few hundred years. It is 60 times more potent at capturing heat energy than CO2, but thankfully lasts less time in the atmosphere. It has been estimated that methane will cause 15-17% of global warming this century. Mammals produce quite large quantities of this, the majority of which tends to get trapped by ice crystals at the bottom of the ocean and remains there unless the sea temperature changes or the pressure changes. The consequence of this being ‘liberated’ on a large scale is absolutely catastrophic.
Nitrous oxide (laughing gas) is 270 times more efficient at trapping heat than CO2 and last 150 years in the atmosphere. Today there is 20% more nitrous oxide in the atmosphere than there was at the beginning of the Industrial revolution. This is mainly due to the burning of fossil fuels and the increased use of nitrogenous fertilizers by farmers.
Hydroflurocarbons (HFC) and Chloroflurocarbons (CFC). Man made ingenuity! These gases are ten thousand times more potent at capturing heat energy than CO2 and they last in the atmosphere for many centuries. Mainly responsible for destroying ozone and creating a hole in that protective layer.
Earthly Participants in Climate Change
Everybody has probably heard of the Gulf Stream which flows from the Gulf of Mexico, carrying heat with it, north, to Europe. If this gets interrupted, slows or even stops, which has happened in the past, Europe ceases to be warmed and a new ice age starts. Central France will ends up feeling a lot like Siberia. This Gulf Stream interruption is caused when large amounts of fresh water enters it, as it would when global warming occurs and the polar ice melts.
El Nino: This cycle brings extreme climatic changes often causing two thirds of the planet to be subjected to droughts, flood and other extreme weather. As greenhouse gases build up in the atmosphere we will experience persistent El Nino like conditions.
“Climate scientists are now debating whether humans have already tripped the switch that will create an ice-free Earth. If so, we have already committed our planet and ourselves to a rise in sea level of around sixty seven meters.ᾠ (p.141). This will mean that cities, towns and villages are going to disappear under water, starting in our lifetimes.
Three Major Tripping Points
Scenario 1:
“In 2003 the Pentagon commissioned a report outlining the implications for US national security should the Gulf Stream collapse.ᾠ Well, apart from the ‘shit hitting the fan’ in all sorts of ways, economically, politically and socially, scientists are now trying to understand its consequences on biological productivity in the North Atlantic ocean. How does a fall by 50% sound? With a global reduction in oceanic productivity of 20%? The Pentagon wasn’t very optimistic about man’s ability to co-operate during this crisis.
“It is possible, if the Gulf Stream were to slow, that extreme falls in temperature could be felt over Europe and North America within a couple of wintersᾠ. (p.181)
Scenario 2:
The collapse of the Amazon rainforests also represents a huge potential problem for global warming, setting up a positive feedback mechanism that would increase CO2 in the atmosphere to 1000 parts per million and turn forests into deserts. According to current modeling we should see this start to happen in 2040.
Scenario 3:
Methane release from the sea floor. The biggest extinction ever to occur (so far) was 245 million years ago when 9 out of 10 animals died. Palaentologists are starting to suspect that methane released from the sea floor had something to do with it. All that would be required would be for the pressure on it to be relieved or the sea temperature of the deep or Arctic oceans to increase.
What is the solution?
Stop or reduce the use of fossil fuels. Start using other forms of energy. And interestingly enough: “If aircraft were to fly lower, cirrus cloud formation could be cut in half and CO2 emissions lowered by 4%, while average flight times over Europe would vary by less than a minuteᾠ(p.248)
The author says “If everyone takes action to rid atmospheric carbon emissions from their lives, I believe we can stabilize and then save the Arctic and Antarctic. We could save around four out of every five species currently under threat, limit the extent of extreme weather events and reduce, almost to zero, the possibility of any of the three great disasters occurring this century, especially the collapse of the Gulf Stream and the destruction of the Amazon.ᾠ (p249)
I don’t believe the chances of this are very good. We need world leaders to start looking at this situation as the very real threat it is, rather than being caught up in their short term fantasies of money making and war mongering. The only thing that could possibly save the climate, in my opinion is some sort of massive reduction in human population. I guess doesn’t make me an optimist.
I thoroughly recommend this book for an easy to understand scientific view of global warming, its consequences and causes. Climate change isn’t something new and because it hasn’t happened significantly in the last 8 thousand years; we tend to forget that it is already happening now and the world may be a very different place within as many as eighty years.