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Another site which process all the satelite data every day is the cryosphere today [arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu ] at the univeristy of illinois.
We were not supposed to see this amount of ice lost until 2050, so we are a good 40 years ahead of schedule for a summertime ice free arctic.
Start planning your North Pole sailing trips now :)
.. Remember when Cat 5 huricanes where rare, once every 5 to 10 years...
You mean like this? :
"Okeechobee" 1928 140 260 160
"Bahamas" 1932 140 260 160
"Labor Day" 1935 140 260 160
"New England" 1938 140 260 160
Or this? :
"Fort Lauderdale" 1947 140 260 160
Dog 1950 160 295 185
Easy 1951 140 260 160
Janet 1955 150 280 175
Cleo 1958 140 260 160
Donna 1960 140 260 160
Ethel 1960 140 260 160
Carla 1961 150 280 175
Hattie 1961 140 260 160
..Nano technology is the US has made solar cells a fifth of the price...
No it has not.
Heard about the snowball earth? Another theory. Lava earth? Another theory. The recorded temps are a mere speck in the geologic time line of 'earth'.
Malthus predicted world wide devastating famines (and shortages) that would wipe out an entire population less than half of the current population.
In the 70s 'they' also said we only had ten years worth of fossil fuels left.
Gore and his doomshouter ilk can kiss my brown winking eye. Fear is worth a buck or two.
Remember the 70s?
Another theory.
The day there's more money to be made in stopping global warming as there is in perpetuating it - it will be dealt with quickly.
Until then.... any one of those politicians will kiss your brown winking eye for the right price. ;)
Frankly I can understand the following positions:
1) Global Warming is real and is being caused by human activities, and something must be done.
2) Global Warming is real and is being caused by human activities, and its already to late to do anything, so we might as well party like its 1999.
3) Global Warming is real but is being caused by external factors, and our fate is up to mother earth
What I don't understand is people denying that the earth is currently in a warming cycle altogether.
PS: I am also trying to forget the 70's :)
I don't deny that, but there is absolutely no consensus on the cause. The more I read on the subject the more it becomes apparent to me that many scientists are simply refusing to admit that, 'we don't know for sure' and that's bad science.
I have slung no mud either, Gore's cronies are some of the worst offenders when it comes to using scare tactics and pushing bad science, simply refusing to print or consider any evidence that conflicts with their point of view. Many other groups put forth a much better argument and are willing to at least deal with conflicting evidence.
I readily admit that I don't have the knowledge or scholarship necessary to understand all the theories or science, but I can certainly grasp some of the conflicting viewpoints with regard to causes and solutions.
I bleieve the adversarial tone began with the first mention of the word 'liberal'. So, if I don't agree with certain causes of global warming I must be what? Conservative? Republican? Science shouldn't have a political bias, period.
..Nano technology is the US has made solar cells a fifth of the price...
No it has not.
Interesting - that is the quote on the website for the company that is producing it. But we haven't seen it in the UK so perhaps just spin or someone upstream selling it at the same price as the normal solar panels?
Well, it appears the mud slinging has started.
Nah, no mud-slinging here. I've moved on to slinging little chunks of glacier :o
First, the title, supplied by the OP
Arctic ice pack reaches historic minimum
Certainly sounds ominous. Historic minimum. But a quick perusal shows that the 'history' they're talking about only goes back to 1979. In the time line of earth's history, that's a mere blip.
What is the role global warming play in this? Who knows?
Contributing to the loss: sea-level pressure and clear skies
and:
High temperatures
But wait a minute, what's this about 2004?
While 2007 was very warm, it is not the warmest year ever; 2004 showed stronger warm anomalies. However, the strength of the high-pressure anomaly, leading to clearer skies, is unusual for this time of year.
So, a very warm year with an 'unusual' high pressure anomaly. now let's look at the word 'anomaly'. Deviation from the normal or common order or form or rule. Okay, so it's a deviation, at least from data points they have in their meager data set. But it's definitely not a trend.
Then we get,
Taken together, the rapid sea ice losses that we've seen in June and July can partly be explained from the effects of this "triple whammy": it was warm; atmospheric circulation pushed ice away from the coast; and skies have been fairly clear.
A whammy? Not very scientific, I prefer 'confluence of events'. To their credit though, no mention of global warming. They simply say,
All of this leads us to ask: why has the melt season progressed so quickly? The answer lies in a combination of high temperatures, changes in the age and thickness of ice, and fluctuations in atmospheric circulations.
There's still no consensus on whether or not a hole in the ozone has appeared before, in years past when it would not have been detected, whether it is/was beneficial to the planet or not, OMG, what if it was a vent and if it closes the temperatures climb higher?
What if the good old earth needs cycles of warmer and cooler decades or centuries as some sort of balance?
What's that you say? Already been done? OK, forget it...
1. Is global warming happening right now?
It's pretty hard to come up with solid data. Even the model that predicts future warming does not account for past climate changes, where we supposedly have all the historical data,
2. If global warming is happening, is it generated mostly by human activity?
Other panets are apparently warming even more rapidly than earth in this very moment.
3. Is CO2 increase the main cause?
If so, why are other planets also warming?
4. If so, what should we - all humankind - do?
If CO2 increase is THE problem here, does that mean we should fine countries whose carbon emissions go beyond some level or other?
Every link on the above chain of "logic" is still quite suspect. That last point especially is where big politics wades in. So, in some people's view, the phrase "global warming" becomes a quick, knee-jerk code for "slow down or halt the growth of developing nations". Some people read that as "maintain current levels of disease and poverty as much as possible." That's the big concern for me - we have a political and economic weapon being weilded, not just a good-hearted effort to fix a problem.
I used to be a tree-hugging environmentalist. Then I read Michael Crichton's "State of Fear" - a good novel with a potent bibliography, books and papers well worth giving some extra research time, if you care at all about having a sane response to this "issue".
I still care about the environment - it only makes sense to take proper care of the place. But the energy of many caring people can be spun and misdirected quite easily, sometimes for nefarious ends. It's happened before. So I prefer not to give my energies to easy slogans - catch phrases that are supposed to address important issues, but often carry terrible hidden baggage.
I'm pro-global warming because I live in Alaska. ;-)
I'm pro-global warming because I live in Alaska. ;-)
Did you see that glacier surfing video someone posted earlier? That was insane!
Anyway, I think you'll need to wait a few hundred years before Alaska is warm enough to benefit from GW.
..Interesting - that is the quote on the website for the company that is producing it...
Nope, unfortunately that is yet more hype in the ever more and more hyped renewable/solar industry/game. They *might* get the nanotech to work in production and have a decent lifespan in all types of climates in 8-12 years, but I am not giving up Cheetos until they do.
The last time I saw this much BS was in December, 1999....
[solarbuzz.com...]
(graph on front page).
Lots of new solar PV manufacturing is starting to come on-line too. For example, IBM just go into the game. I wonder if the "consult" on your PV first?
Rgds
Damon
There is a current study to see if there has been less sea ice during the holocene period (10000 years ago.
So we can expand historical from 28 years to 10000 years.
This pretty much covers human civilization.
Right now with almost 7 billion people on the planet, even minor climate changes are going to have a major impact, and with a history of countries killing each other over, minor territorial disputes, religion and other stupid reasons I don't hold up much hope.
Think the sub is now off to the South Pole for more flag planting fun
NB: Canada have claimed planting a flag at the bottom before anyone else!
solar PV prices are dropping long-term...
In the US they are about 10% higher now than they were in 2004, corrected for inflation.
In Nov 2004 we paid $2.97 a watt wholesale for a large solar panel. Now we our cheapest price is $3.95 per watt for the same panel.
Now lots of new manufacturing is going on line soon and over the next five years, which will bring prices down as capacity goes up. (Look at SolarBuzz to get an idea of plant-commissioning timescales.)
I would expect the cycles to be many years long.
Rgds
Damon
PS. And prices are dropping faster in the UK for me than they may be for you in the US... They are still MUCH cheaper for you than for me right now.
[edited by: DamonHD at 8:38 pm (utc) on Aug. 22, 2007]
I am hoping that WTO and EU changes will make these fairly insulting differentials go away. And I think that there's some evidence that it's happening.
The UK government subsidies are not amazing compared to say Germany or California for example, as I understand it, though I'm no expert!
Rgds
Damon
AFP via Yahoo! News: Belching moose add to global warming [news.yahoo.com]
With an estimated 140,000 moose roaming Norway's forests, that is a total of of 294,000,000 kilograms of CO2 per year.
Global warming is real and Norwegian moose are to blame!
I am quite sure that this is a conspiracy by the vast right-wing cow illuminati to divert attention from the great cow flatulence debacle.
