Scientists in the US have presented one of the most dramatic forecasts yet for the disappearance of Arctic sea ice.
Their latest modelling studies indicate northern polar waters could be ice-free in summers within just 5-6 years.
Professor Wieslaw Maslowski told an American Geophysical Union meeting that previous projections had underestimated the processes now driving ice loss…
“Our projection of 2013 for the removal of ice in summer is not accounting for the last two minima, in 2005 and 2007,” the researcher from the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California, explained to the BBC.
“So given that fact, you can argue that maybe our projection of 2013 is already too conservative.”
Lockstep reactionaries may as well skip the article – and Maslowski’s criticism of his own work as being too conservative. Plus, why the IPCC uses “averaged” projections which may be too conservative.
# 56 Jetfire
“Electric cars suck Period. You have the battery issue. Range and the time to recharge.
Hydrogen is not ready cost way to much to make takes more energy than you get back out of it.
Ethanol is the biggest joke and sin that we have going. Yes, lets burn a food crop and not feed the people who need and raise the price of everything else.”
Well FUCK! Why not just give up then.
You need to look at the electric car thing again I am afraid. http://www.teslamotors.com/ Granted not for the weak hearted. But it can be done and they haven’t even been at it that many years.
# 57 Angus
“The earth is doomed anyways in a few billion years, as the sun slowly grows into a Red Giant and incinerates Earth. So, what’s the use. Die todady, die tomorrow, or die eventually. It’s the one constant in the Universe.”
That’s the sprit!!!!
# 59 Misanthropic Scott
“I just might do it.”
You are a braver man than I. I would say fuckem they deserve what they get.
# 63 JimR
“You would put 2 bullet into a guy who threatens you”
Oh NO NO No No. Hollow points. Much more effective
I consider someone in my house with a knife and an intent to kill me and my family more than a threat. I consider that an immediate life or death situation.
“but you are doing nothing but “lip service” to stop oil companies killing you more slowly (according to you). Hint, screwing in 10 cfl lightbulbs and driving a hybrid won’t do it. ”
Hey JIMR Wake the fuck up!!!!!!!!!!!
I do WAY more than driving a hybrid and screwing in cfl light bulbs. I donate money to scientific research. I invest in “green” technology companies. I also donate money to politicians I know will work to combat the problem. That I just the tip of the ice burg. Now am I 100% green NO. But I do a least as much as I can and that is more than most.
“Until I see 2000 scientists and a zillion other protestors on the streets of NYC for immediate remedial action worldwide, I won’t take them too seriously”
So people should be on the edge of riot before change should happen?
#64 J
“You need to look at the electric car thing again I am afraid. http://www.teslamotors.com/ ”
Thanks for making my point. Do you know how much gas I can buy for the $98,000? I didn’t even get to any of the Tech spec.
If you read the begining of my post I said when these things can compete equal to gas than people will buy them. But non-of them do yet and it’s not some big oil company conspiracy.
# 66 Jetfire
“If you read the begining of my post I said when these things can compete equal to gas than people will buy them. But non-of them do yet and it’s not some big oil company conspiracy.”
no no no you said “Electric cars suck Period. You have the battery issue. Range and the time to recharge.”
Tesla has made battery recycling a main pert of their focus. They designed the car with that in mind
250 miles per charge? That isn’t enough for you? The average person doesn’t drive anywhere near that much per day. time to recharge. 3.5 hours to full charge? Do you really think that is a problem for most people? Park you car in the garage at night and plug it in. How fucking hard is that?
Well until people start buying them they won’t get much cheaper.
WTF does how much gas you can buy got to do with it. It isn’t about money it is about survival of the planet.
#66 – Jetfire,
#64 J
“You need to look at the electric car thing again I am afraid. http://www.teslamotors.com/ ”
Thanks for making my point. Do you know how much gas I can buy for the $98,000? I didn’t even get to any of the Tech spec.
Actually, if you look at the tesla, you must compare it to a Ferrari roadster at around $250K.
“250 miles per charge? 3.5 hours to full charge?”
My Q45 gets 300+ miles per tank and takes 5 minutes to refuel. That’s why Electric sucks or do I need a second car for long trips.
“It isn’t about money it is about survival of the planet.”
You must be on the wrong planet than. Everything comes down to money. Like being able to afford it the first place. I bought my Q45 used for $10,000 and I still have $88,000 to buy gas.
So lets 88,000/3.50/g (thats more than I every paid by the way) =25,143 Gallons of gas I can buy. I get about 20mpg so 25,143 * 20=502,857 miles I could drive. Average about 15,000 a year on mileage. So I could drive for 33 years.
Maybe by that time they’ll have an electric car that works like a gas care.
Not even looking at the Electric car and just one of the Hybrids gas would have to be over $5.00 a gallon to be worth while.
Oh you would all also so have to believe that the earth wasn’t going to survive.
FYI the human population will continue to grow and need to consume even more power. So your efficiency would have to take that into affect.
So if the earth is that doomed just start new world war and reduce the world’s population by a few Billion
That will be awesome when the NW passage is open again.
That will also mean a better chance at getting wines from Newfoundland again and dairy farms as well.
Now of course we all know that when this happened around 1100CE the earth came to a complete end and all human life was extinguished right??? Right?? We all know that we were brought after 1200CE from the mother ships just like L. Ron Hubbard said so!
OK I’m done being sardonic.
Cursor_
#70–that NW passage is open again (not all the time but sometimes which is new in our human history) which is why Russia is planting its flag at the north pole in order to secure mineral resources–ie==oil.
Evidently, the newcomer for utility is the compressed air car. What I read about it is too good to be true, but soon to be manufactured in India. Advances also coming rapidly in Hypdrogen Economy. I expect Hydrogen to become successful because it is similar to the oil distribution system so Oil Boys likely to buy into it. I think unknown technology will save us if the methane doesn’t get us first.
# 69 Jetfire
“My Q45 gets 300+ miles per tank and takes 5 minutes to refuel.”
How often do you drive over 300 miles a day? If you don’t than refueling in 5 min doesn’t mean shit
“You must be on the wrong planet than. Everything comes down to money.”
Yes it does and that is part of the problem.
How much was that car new? $30,000, $40,000
The Tesla is brand new!!!!! Of course it is going to be more expensive.
“I get about 20mpg”
the Tesla gets the equivalent of 135mpg and doesn’t put our emission with every tank you burn thru. Don’t bother with the straw man argument of it does when making the electricity at the power plant. That makes the assumption that someone doesn’t have an alternative energy home. To make GAS requires refining which is a very large pollution process
“FYI the human population will continue to grow and need to consume even more power. So your efficiency would have to take that into affect.”
Yes and that is why we need to start making adjustments now.
“So if the earth is that doomed just start new world war and reduce the world’s population by a few Billion”
Oh don’t worry. History shows that to be a high possibility. That or disease
Scot, not accusations, but audience.
This web page has a graph with sea level higher than today’s 19 times in the last 2.6 million years:
http://qra.org.uk/what.html
Agreed, the hydrates will become a problem if the seas become warm enough, but what is “warm enough”?
And I’d love to find a better chart if someone knows where to find one. The sea level scale (right side) is not linear, and what is the line above today’s “0 sea level”?
#70 – Cursor_
The point you’re missing is that we’re expecting a recurrence of 55 million years ago, not a thousand years ago. It will almost certainly be warmer than at any time in the last million years.
Of course, there is always the possibility that the vast majority of scientists and their peer reviewed papers are wrong about everything. It’s kind of a long shot for bets that involve the survival of our species though, don’t you think?
There is an upside to melting ice; it’ll make oil exploration & drilling in the Arctic a heck of a lot easier!
#73 – Phillep,
This is the sort of thing about which there is real controversy. Unfortunately there is, to my knowledge, no really strong consensus on exactly when or at what temperature the methane would be released.
This is the sort of thing the deniers love. They say, ‘see there’s no consensus.’ It’s true about exactly when things like this might happen. However, there is, to my knowledge. little doubt about the gross problem of climate change. Any disagreements are about the details.
#73–Phillep==simple google turned up wikiepedia of course. The two charts seem to fit the bill for the past 500 Million years.
Looks like the oceans are about as high as they have ever been and getting higher:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_level_rise
googling methane hydrate climate change also brings up alot of good reads. As usual, more complicated than we might think at first blush.
That is a theory nothing more that the warming is caused by human actions. There are too many variables, and they are trying to study it, but when you start with the ‘fact’ that it is caused by humans, the science tends to go that way.
Nevertheless, we have a historical record that shows that CO2 increased after temperature rises not before, and that temperature rises are highly correlated with temperature, see the chart I posted above.
>one discrepancy the global warming camp has made?
Here’s one that I’ve said before.
When scientists calculate the effects of global warming, they produce scenarios of devastation and famine. Yet to produce the amount of warming that creates this devastation and famine, they assume large amounts of carbon emitted form developing countries. This much carbon means plenty of economic growth(really they are assuming more than the US grew in the 1800s and 1900s!)
The contradiction is that with that much economic growth, the countries will be better able to adapt to global warming, so less devastation. It’s why we have fewer hurricane and earthquake deaths than other countries.
Take another look at the “Global Sea Level Fluctuations” chart (5th image down). Sea Level is estimated at 400 meters above today’s back 450M yrs ago. (Weird. Where’d all that water come from?)
There was another peak about 75M yrs ago, about +230m.
4th image, take a look at that expanded view. Does it look like they are claiming that sea level was higher a few thousand years ago?
I wish this big melt-off would hurry up and happen. There’ll finally be plenty of space on the freeways after the big die-off. Warming sounds like a pretty good thing to me.
It’s all been hyped up to the max. What the scientists tell us and what they believe are completely different. Let’s get rid of big polluters once and for all, but for christ sakes, I wish the IPCC would stop the dog and pony show. And stop blaming the oil companies for existing unless you don’t buy their products. I fully expect the big IPCC global warming bomb will become a fizzle over the next 10-15 years.
Nite.
#81 – GW,
Yup. There’ll certainly be plenty of room on the highways after the die off. If a tree falls in the forest and there’s no one there to hear it, does it make a sound? If a highway has plenty of room, but there’s no one around to drive on it, who gives a rat’s ass? I for one, don’t give even one rat buttock, let alone an entire rat’s ass.
#82 -0 JimR,
Sorry, but did you know that at least one scientist on the IPCC is from each of: The United States, Saudi Arabia, China, and Australia? These are the largest oil importer, oil exporter, coal burner, and coal exporter, respectively.
So, when these four or more scientists say it, it’s probably true. Or, at least, they don’t have any good data to contradict it, despite being hired to do so.
#79–Mike===Huh? I think you blew a gasket. I’ve heard the “facts” you state in other contexts, but you have gibberished them all up.
The complaint about global warming is sea rise and weather pattern shift. It matters little to the millions of folks living within 50 miles and 10 feet of seal level if America gets richer while their homes/farm fields become 20 feet under water.
More details to follow if you remain obstinate.
We will have to adapt, or die. Humans are good at adaptation, but leaders are, unfortunately, not.
#74
Humans have a few more tricks up their sleeves than people suspect.
I have seen over the years of my life that the human race is very BAD about ounces of prevention; but very GOOD at pounds of cure. In essense humans wait until the last minute to resolve crisis.
I’m totally unconcerned that humanity may buy the farm. The operative word is MAY of course.
Cursor_
Read it again. Not just America, the scientists’ model simulations assume that the 3rd world gets wealthier. That’s where all the extra CO2 comes from, without it their worst case estimates don’t get spit out by the model.
PhilieP, I don’t believe that water was ever a quarter of a mile higher than it is now.
By the way, I’m looking forward to all that free ice in 5 years. I hate haveing to pay $3 for a ten pound bag. I think I[‘m close enough that the trip will be worth it.
Yeah there are no scientists with other agendas in America, Australia, China, or Saudi Arabia. They all follow the perceived interests of their country.
#18 “Maybe that’s not a bad idea. Lets get some highly respected scientists from both sides to open up their research, not just a debate but actual data in a structured forum so we can get the facts.”
Here is the problem, there are no highly respected scientists on the anti-global warming side. There are these guys not one of whom is an actual climatologist and many of the names have connection to the oil and coal industry.
If you want actual data and research from real climatologists may I suggest http://realclimate.org
I’d list Steve McIntyre as a real scientist. I’m not sure what his field is, but he has debunked some of the biggest global warming talking points. Thanks to him, the hockey stick is no longer used, and 1998 is longer the warmest year on record(somehow the media was toop busy to announce NASA’s new figures)