World headed for irreversible climate change in five years, IEA warns | Environment. The world is likely to build so many fossil-fuelled power stations, energy-guzzling factories and inefficient buildings in the next five years that it will become impossible to hold global warming to safe levels, and the last chance of combating dangerous climate change will be "lost for ever", according to the most thorough analysis yet of world energy infrastructure. Anything built from now on that produces carbon will do so for decades, and this "lock-in" effect will be the single factor most likely to produce irreversible climate change, the world's foremost authority on energy economics has found. If this is not rapidly changed within the next five years, the results are likely to be disastrous.
"The door is closing," Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency, said. "I am very worried – if we don't change direction now on how we use energy, we will end up beyond what scientists tell us is the minimum [for safety]. The door will be closed forever. " The brutal logic of climate change. The consensus in American politics today is that there’s nothing to be gained from talking about climate change. It’s divisive, the electorate has more pressing concerns, and very little can be accomplished anyway. In response to this evolving consensus, lots of folks in the climate hawk coalition (broadly speaking) have counseled a new approach that backgrounds climate change and refocuses the discussion on innovation, energy security, and economic competitiveness. This cannot work. At least it cannot work if we hope to avoid terrible consequences. Why not? It’s simple: If there is to be any hope of avoiding civilization-threatening climate disruption, the U.S. and other nations must act immediately and aggressively on an unprecedented scale.
It is unpleasant to talk like this. So let’s have some real talk on climate change. Let’s walk through Anderson’s logic. 1. The 2 degrees C number has been around for over a decade and was reaffirmed by the Copenhagen Accord just last year. 2. 3. Arctic sea ice volume: The death spiral continues. By Joe Romm on May 19, 2011 at 5:00 pm "Arctic sea ice volume: The death spiral continues" One-year-old ice in Beaufort Sea now a foot thinner than in 2009 In November, Rear Admiral David Titley, the Oceanographer of the Navy, testified that “the volume of ice as of last September has never been lower”¦in the last several thousand years.” Titley, who is also the Director of Navy’s Task Force Climate Change, said he has told the Chief of Naval Operations that “we expect to see four weeks of basically ice free conditions in the mid to late 2030s.” Wieslaw Maslowski of the Naval Postgraduate School has “projected a (virtually) ice-free fall by 2016 (+/- 3 yrs).”
Until then, we have some new observational data of Canadian sea ice thickness and this remarkable figure of sea ice volume since 1979 from Neven’s Arctic Sea Ice Blog, based on data from the University of Washington’s Polar Science Center [click to enlarge]: Compare this to Maslowski’s March 2010 PowerPoint: Entrepreneur: Capitalism Will Save World from Climate Crisis to Preserve Markets for iPads, Coke. On Sunday, Democracy Now! Attended the corporate-sponsored World Climate Summit in Durban that advocates a market approach to solving the climate crisis. One attendee, South African entrepreneur Jason Drew, called for the United Nations to step aside and let businesses and markets fix the problems caused by global warming. When asked why business would be interested in saving the people of the Maldives from catastrophic climate change, Drew responded, "Customers live there. It’s a business world.
It’s capitalism. We need people to buy our goods... They all buy iPads, Coca-Cola, all the products we know. This is a rush transcript. AMY GOODMAN: We’re broadcasting live throughout this week, ending tomorrow, here in Durban, South Africa, where the COP 17 is having its meeting, the Conference of Parties, the U.N. On Sunday, Democracy Now! JASON DREW: We’re here talking about COP 17.
JASON DREW: Consumers live there. AMY GOODMAN: South African entrepreneur Jason Drew. Show Full Transcript › "Get It Done": Urging Climate Justice, Youth Delegate Anjali Appadurai Mic Checks U.N. Summit. A number of protests are being held today at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Durban to protest the failure of world leaders to agree to immediately agree to a deal of binding emissions cuts.
Anjali Appadurai, a student at the College of the Atlantic in Maine, addressed the conference on behalf of youth delegates. Just after her speech, she led a mic check from the stage — a move inspired by the Occupy Wall Street protests. "It always seems impossible until it’s done," Appadurai said. "So, distinguished delegates and governments around the world, governments of the developed world: Deep [emissions] cuts now. This is a rush transcript. AMY GOODMAN: A number of protests are being held today at the climate change conference to protest the failure of world leaders to agree to immediately agree to a deal of binding emissions cuts.
ANJALI APPADURAI: I speak for more than half the world’s population. We’re in Africa, home to communities on the front line of climate change. Lauding "Collapse of Global Warming Movement," Sen. Inhofe Tells U.N. Summit "You Are Being Ignored" While no members of the U.S. Congress attended the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Durban, Republican Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma recorded a video message that was aired at a press conference of climate change deniers here at the summit on Wednesday.
"Tossing out any remote possibility of a U.N. global warming treaty is one of the most important things we can do for the economy," Sen. Inhofe said. "I’m making this announcement from Washington, D.C., where I am confident that the only person left talking about global warming is me. This is a rush transcript. AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to go to a clip of Senator Inhofe. SEN. I’m making this announcement from Washington, D.C., where I am confident that the only person left talking about global warming is me. AMY GOODMAN: That was Senator Inhofe of Oklahoma talking about celebrating the nail in the coffin. KATE HORNER: Well, of course, on the science, he’s just blatantly wrong.
Show Full Transcript › ‹ Hide Full Transcript. Clathrate gun hypothesis. The blue graph shows the apparent percentage (not the absolute number) of marine animalgenera becoming extinct during any given time interval. It does not represent all marine species, just those that are readily fossilized. The labels of the "Big Five" extinction events are clickable hyperlinks; see Extinction event for more details. (source and image info) The clathrate gun hypothesis is the popular name given to the hypothesis that rises in sea temperatures (and/or falls in sea level) can trigger the sudden release of methane from methane clathrate compounds buried in seabeds and permafrost which, because the methane itself is a powerful greenhouse gas, leads to further temperature rise and further methane clathrate destabilization – in effect initiating a runaway process as irreversible, once started, as the firing of a gun.[1] Mechanism[edit] Specific structure of a gas hydrate piece, from the subduction zone off Oregon Gas hydrate-bearing sediment, from the subduction zone off Oregon.
Ancient Ocean Acidification Intimates Long Recovery from Climate Change. Single-cell life-forms thrive throughout the world's oceans—and have for hundreds of millions of years. Tiny varieties known as calcareous nanoplankton build exuberant, microscopic shells—resembling wagon wheels, fishlike scales, even overlapping oval shields decorated with craggy explosions at their centers—known as "coccoliths". The ability to form these shells rests on the amount of calcium carbonate (CaCO3) dissolved in the seawater—and that amount depends on the concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2). CO2 is the ubiquitous greenhouse gas emitted by human activity, particularly fossil-fuel and forest burning. As levels rise in the atmosphere (currently at 390 parts per million and counting), the ocean's surface waters absorb more of the molecule.
This water–CO2 mixture forms carbonic acid, which slightly lowers the ocean's overall pH (the lower the pH, the more acidic). Of course the present era is hardly the first time the planet has seen higher levels of CO2.