Re/Action on Climate Protection

Climate Change Newsfeeds

You may not have noticed the left column of our blog. It has been reorganized so that some newsfeeds that we feature are more accessible. The three newsfeeds on our left column are The Climate Ark (Climate Change Newsfeed), a site from the UK called Climate Change Action, and the premier climate change science site RealClimate.

These newsfeeds are updated constantly, with the five most recent entries shown in the left column. Clicking on the link will take you to the article. The Climate Change Newsfeed is very active, with the latest news items related to climate change. Climate Change Action is an interesting site, with links to the "Campaign Against Climate Change", a UK climate activism group.

RealClimate isn't updated very often, but it contains a wealth of information about the latest findings in climate science. It contains refutations of some of the most popular climate change myths, as well as rebuttals of Michael Crichton's book, State of Fear.

Enjoy the links, and also check out our Climate Protection Campaign website and white paper wiki links.

More on Warming in Sonoma County

Did some more analysis on temperature data in Sonoma County. This time the data is from the Santa Rosa C weather station, and goes back to 1950. Santa Rosa is the biggest city in Sonoma County, and has experienced the largest population growth. Interestingly, this data also shows warming, about 2 degrees, in the average of annual high and low temperatures

However, there is a fundamental difference with the Graton data.

Warming in Sonoma County

I was curious about whether the effect of warming would show up in our county. I got the temperature data from our local weather station going back to 1949. I calculated the average annual high temperature for each year and plotted it on the above graph. I drew a linear trendline through the data. You can see that the average temperature has increased 3-4 degrees during this time. This doesn't necessarily mean we are seeing this amount of warming over this time period, but it is pretty suspicious. This is an example of how a layperson can see the effects of global warming in their own locality.

I got the temperature data here.

The carbon cycle

There is a strong and well-known correlation between the level or concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (expressed in parts per million or ppm) and the average global surface temperature. It has been shown by the work of Michael Mann and others that as the level of atmospheric carbon dioxide has increased in the past 200 or so years, the global average surface temperature has increased. This is the basis for the theory of global warming.

Why has the level of carbon dioxide increased?  It is widely agreed that two human activities are primarily responsible: 1) the burning of fossil fuels; 2) deforestation. Fossil fuels are "ancient carbon." Deforestation decreases the biosphere's ability to take up and store carbon. Why do these factors change the atmosphere?

The level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is regulated by the carbon cycle. This is a natural process whereby the element carbon is transferred between "natural sources" and "natural sinks". Sources and sinks are like pipes that are connected to "carbon stocks." The largest natural carbon stocks are the lithosphere (crude oil, coal, magma), the biosphere (all carbon-based life), the oceans and the atmosphere. Carbon is transferred among the stocks via flows between sources and sinks. The uptake of atmospheric carbon dioxide by plants is an example of a flow to a sink. Decomposition of organic material is another example of a flow. A volcanic eruption is another example. The amount of carbon in the cycle changes over geologic time, i.e., eons.

When humans burn coal or products derived from crude oil, the carbon dioxide from this burning is composed of carbon that was stored in the lithosphere eons ago. It was taken out of the carbon cycle and stored, or sequestered, in the lithosphere. Now it is being re-injected into the carbon cycle at a rate that is unprecedented in the history of the planet. The "ancient carbon" that is being emitted is ending up in the two stocks that are able to accept it: the oceans and the atmosphere. The signs of increased carbon levels in the ocean are increasing pH level or increasing acidity. This is having a profound effect on ocean life. The sign of increased carbon level in the atmosphere is increasing carbon dioxide concentration. The carbon dioxide level is now the highest it has been in the last 400,000 years, and possibly the last 20 million years. The rate of increase of the carbon dioxide level is unprecedented in the history of the planet.

Here is a link to the IPCC TAR discussion of the carbon cycle.

http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/098.htm

Katrina

We have been shocked by scenes of devastation in New Orleans and the Gulf coast. Our hearts go out to the victims. In our climate protection community, there has been a debate about the extent to which global warming played a part in the intensity of Katrina, and the attendant level of destruction. We have looked into the changing science of hurricanes generally, and the growing recognition that climate change may be playing a role in the intensity of tropical storms. However, the science is complex, and it is difficult to say what part global warming actually has in the intensity of any given storm.

Here is a statement that I believe expresses the essence of the scientific opinion on hurricanes and global warming:

In evaluating all tropical storms, globally, the (average?) storm energy has increased over the past 30 years. There is a correlation between increase in the energy of the storms, and the increase in tropical sea surface temperature. It is likely that global warming is causing the increase in sea surface temperature. Therefore, there is a finite probability that the effects of global warming had some effect on the energy in Katrina. However, this probability, and the amount of contribution of global warming to any individual storm, can’t be known. It is not possible even to know whether the contribution is small or large. It is likely that other influences, such as the well-known multi-decadal North Atlantic climate cycles, are more of a factor in the increase in Atlantic tropical storm intensity over the past ten years. Over longer periods of time, into the future, the influence of global warming will become more of a factor in the intensity of storms, if current trends continue.

Here is a link to a good discussion of hurricanes and global warming on Real Climate:

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=181

Here is a link to climate scientist Kerry Emanuel's explanation of the effect of global warming on hurricanes:

http://wind.mit.edu/~emanuel/anthro2.htm