Environmental News and Global Warming

Survival

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CONTENTS Click HERE to Read  the Truth About Climate Change! CLICK HERE to visit the Coral Reef Action Page Click HERE to see a report on Global Warming in the Arctic Region. Click Here to see a report on Global Warming in the Antarctic Region The Earth Is Our Mother New Warning On Arctic Ice Cap Melting Snowmelt In Antarctica Creeping Inland, Based On 20 Year Of NASA Data NASA Finds Vast Regions of West Antarctica Melted in Recent Past ANTARCTIC'S ICE 'MELTING FASTER' WHATS WRONG WITH DESTROYING THE OZONE AND MELTING ALL THE ICE AT THE POLES? THE EARTH IS OUR MOTHER!!! The Earth supports us.  Stripping her bare of all her resources is like a baby sucking it's mother dry and then dying in the womb.   Ripping up her forests, dumping waste into her oceans, exploding nuclear missiles in the South Pacific, and burning trash that we should be recycling is the same as turning on your Mother and trying to kill her!!!  I hear you cry, 'but there's nothing I can do!' There IS something you can do, whether it is only recycling your waste.  Paper, glass, aluminum and some plastics can all be recycled.  It doesn't take a great deal of effort to do this.  If you are a political activist write to you local politician and join an organization dedicated to the care of the world.   If you are attending college there may be a body concerned with these things already in place, and if there isn't, start one.  Don't buy things from companies known to pollute, try not to pollute yourself.   Yes, all these things well take effort and time, but in the long run if we all took just 5 minutes a day to do the right thing, we could stop the world from being completely drained within the next generation. Whenever you save energy--or use it more efficiently--you reduce the demand for gasoline, oil, coal, and natural gas. Less burning of these fossil fuels means lower emissions of carbon dioxide, the major contributor to global warming.   Right now the U.S. releases about 40,000 pounds of carbon dioxide per person each year. If we can reduce energy use enough to lower greenhouse gas emissions by about 2% a year, in ten years we will "lose" about 7000 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions per person. Here are 20 simple steps that can help cut your annual emissions of carbon dioxide by thousands of pounds. The carbon dioxide reduction shown for each action is an average saving. HOME APPLIANCES 1.Run your dishwasher only with a full load. Use the energy-saving setting to dry the dishes. Don't use heat when drying.  Carbon dioxide reduction: 200 pounds a year. 2.Wash clothes in warm or cold water, not hot. Carbon dioxide reduction (for two loads a week): up to 500 pounds a year. 3.Turn down your water heater thermostat; 120 degrees is usually hot enough.  Carbon dioxide reduction (for each 10- degree adjustment): 500 pounds a year. HOME HEATING AND COOLING 4.Don't overheat or overcool rooms. Adjust your thermostat (lower in winter, higher in summer).  Carbon dioxide reduction (for each 2-degree adjustment): about 500 pounds a year. 5.Clean or replace air filters as recommended. Cleaning a dirty air conditioner filter can save 5% of the energy used.  Carbon dioxide reduction: About 175 pounds a year. SMALL INVESTMENTS THAT PAY OFF 6.Buy energy-efficient compact fluorescent bulbs for your most-used lights.    Carbon dioxide reduction (by replacing one frequently used bulb): about 500 pounds a year. 7.Wrap your water heater in an insulating jacket.   Carbon dioxide reduction: Up to 1000 pounds a year. 8.Install low-flow shower heads to use less hot water.  Carbon dioxide reduction: Up to 300 pounds a year. 9.Caulk and weatherstrip around doors and windows to plug air leaks.  Carbon dioxide reduction: Up to 1000 pounds a year. 10.Ask your utility company for a home energy audit to find out where your home is poorly insulated or energy-inefficient.  Carbon dioxide reduction: Potentially, thousands of pounds a year. GETTING AROUND 11.Whenever possible, walk, bike, carpool or use mass transit.  Carbon dioxide reduction (for every gallon of gasoline you save): 20 pounds. 12.When you buy a car, choose one that gets good gas mileage.  Carbon dioxide reduction (if your new car gets 10 mpg more than your old one): about 2500 pounds a year. REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE 13.Reduce waste: Buy minimally packaged goods; choose reusable products over disposable ones; recycle.  Carbon dioxide reduction (if you cut down your garbage by 25%): 1000 pounds a year. 14.If your car has an air conditioner, make sure its coolant is recycled whenever you have it serviced.  Equivalent carbon dioxide reduction: Thousands of pounds. HOME IMPROVEMENTS 15.Insulate your walls and ceilings; this can save about 25% of home heating bills.   Carbon dioxide reduction: Up to 2000 pounds a year. 16.If you need to replace your windows, install the best energy-saving models.    Carbon dioxide reduction: Up to 10,000 pounds a year. 17.Plant trees next to your home and paint your home a light color if you live in a warm climate, or a dark color in a cold climate.  Carbon dioxide reduction: About 5000 pounds a year. 18.As you replace home appliances, select the most energy-efficient models.  Carbon dioxide reduction (if you replace your old refrigerator with an efficient model): 3000 pounds a year. SCHOOLS, BUSINESS, AND COMMUNITIES 19.Reduce waste and promote energy-efficient measures at your school or workplace. Work in your community to set up recycling programs.  Carbon dioxide reduction (for every pound of office paper recycled): 4 pounds.  20.Be informed about environmental issues. Keep track of candidates' voting records and write or call to express concerns.  Carbon dioxide reduction (if we vote to raise U.S. auto fuel efficiency): Billions of pounds.   Ice reveals good news, bad news on climate Experts find natural feedback mechanism, but say it's 'out of equilibrium' Sun., April. 27, 2008 WASHINGTON - Before humans began burning fossil fuels, there was an eons-long balance between carbon dioxide emissions and Earth's ability to absorb them, but now the planet can't keep up, scientists said on Sunday. The finding, reported in the journal Nature Geoscience, relies on ice cores taken from Antarctica's Lake Vostok that contain air samples going back 610,000 years. Climate scientists for the last 25 years or so have suggested that some kind of natural feedback mechanism regulates our planet's temperature and the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Those skeptical about human influence on global warming point to this, not fossil fuel emissions, as the cause for recent climate change. "We have provided the first observational evidence for the operation and efficacy of this feedback, which reveals its essential role for stabilizing the Earth’s long-term climate," the study authors wrote. This feedback mechanism has been thrown out of whack by a steep rise in carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of coal and petroleum for the last 200 years or so, said Richard Zeebe, a co-author of the report. 'Entirely out of equilibrium' "These feedbacks operate so slowly that they will not help us in terms of climate change ... that we're going to see in the next several hundred years," Zeebe said by telephone from the University of Hawaii. "Right now we have put the system entirely out of equilibrium." In the ancient past, excess carbon dioxide came mostly from volcanoes, which spewed very little of the chemical compared to what humans activities do now, but it still had to be addressed. This ancient excess carbon dioxide — a powerful greenhouse gas — was removed from the atmosphere through the weathering of mountains, which take in the chemical. In the end, it was washed downhill into oceans and buried in deep sea sediments, Zeebe said. Zeebe analyzed carbon dioxide that had been captured in Antarctic ice, and by figuring out how much carbon dioxide was in the atmosphere at various points in time, he and his co-author Ken Caldeira, of the Carnegie Department of Global Ecology at Stanford University, determined that it waxed and waned along with the world's temperature. "When the carbon dioxide was low, the temperature was low, and we had an ice age," he said. And while Earth's temperature fell during ice ages and rose during so-called interglacial periods between them, the planet's mean temperature has been going slowly down for about 600,000 years. Lots more molecules in air The average change in the amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide over the last 600,000 years has been just 22 parts per million by volume, Zeebe said, which means that 22 molecules of carbon dioxide were added to, or removed from, every million molecules of air. Since the Industrial Revolution began in the 18th century, ushering in the widespread human use of fossil fuels, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen by 100 parts per million. That means human activities are putting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere about 14,000 times as fast as natural processes do, Zeebe said. And it appears to be speeding up: the U.S. government reported last week that in 2007 alone, atmospheric carbon dioxide increased by 2.4 parts per million. The natural mechanism will eventually absorb the excess carbon dioxide, Zeebe said, but not for hundreds of thousands of years. "This is a time period that we can hardly imagine," he said. "They are way too slow to help us to restore the balance that we have now basically distorted in a very short period of time." Slide Shows Warming signals View images from around the world that show signs of global warming.   Ice at the edge View images of Greenland, where coastal edges of its vast ice cap are melting at an alarming rate.   Interactives Rising seas What future sea levels could mean for some of America's favorite places   The greenhouse effect How the Earth maintains a temperature conducive to life   Cooling the planet Check out five far-out ideas on how to engineer a cooler Earth.   Eyeing the ice The National Science Foundation's Tom Wagner on why climate experts study Antarctica   Melting mountains Data shows five areas of concern   New Warning On Arctic Ice Cap Melting Satellite Images Show Volume Of Sea Ice At Summer's End Was Half That Of 2003 WASHINGTON, Dec. 13, 2007 An iceberg floats in a bay off Ammassalik Island, Greenland July 17, 2007. Arctic sea ice melted to its lowest level ever this year, shattering a record set in 2005. (AP/John McConnico) An already relentless melting of the Arctic greatly accelerated this summer, a warning sign that some scientists worry could mean global warming has passed an ominous tipping point. One speculates that summer sea ice might be gone in just five years. Greenland's ice sheet melted nearly 19 billion tons more than the previous high mark, and the volume of Arctic sea ice at summer's end was half what it was just four years earlier, according to new NASA satellite data obtained by The Associated Press. "The Arctic is screaming," said Mark Serreze, senior scientist at the government's snow and ice data center in Boulder, Colo. Just last year, two top scientists surprised their colleagues by projecting that the Arctic sea ice was melting so rapidly that it could disappear entirely by the summer of 2040. This week, after reviewing his own new data, NASA climate scientist Jay Zwally said: "At this rate, the Arctic Ocean could be nearly ice-free at the end of summer by 2012, much faster than previous predictions." So scientists in recent days have been asking themselves these questions: Was the record melt seen all over the Arctic in 2007 a blip amid relentless and steady warming? Or has everything sped up to a new climate cycle that goes beyond the worst case scenarios presented by computer models? "The Arctic is often cited as the canary in the coal mine for climate warming," said Zwally, who as a teenager hauled coal. "Now as a sign of climate warming, the canary has died. It is time to start getting out of the coal mines." It is the burning of coal, oil and other fossil fuels that produces carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, responsible for man-made global warming. For the past several days, government diplomats have been debating in Bali, Indonesia, the outlines of a new climate treaty calling for tougher limits on these gases. What happens in the Arctic has implications for the rest of the world. Faster melting there means eventual sea level rise and more immediate changes in winter weather because of less sea ice. In the United States, a weakened Arctic blast moving south to collide with moist air from the Gulf of Mexico can mean less rain and snow in some areas, including the drought-stricken Southeast, said Michael MacCracken, a former federal climate scientist who now heads the nonprofit Climate Institute. Some regions, like Colorado, would likely get extra rain or snow. More than 18 scientists told the AP that they were surprised by the level of ice melt this year. "I don't pay much attention to one year ... but this year the change is so big, particularly in the Arctic sea ice, that you've got to stop and say, 'What is going on here?' You can't look away from what's happening here," said Waleed Abdalati, NASA's chief of cyrospheric sciences. "This is going to be a watershed year." (CBS/AP) Records for Arctic melt were shattered in 2007 in the following ways: 552 billion tons of ice melted this summer from the Greenland ice sheet, according to preliminary satellite data to be released by NASA Wednesday. That's 15 percent more than the annual average summer melt, beating 2005's record. A record amount of surface ice was lost over Greenland this year, 12 percent more than the previous worst year, 2005, according to data the University of Colorado released Monday. That's nearly quadruple the amount that melted just 15 years ago. It's an amount of water that could cover Washington, D.C., a half-mile deep, researchers calculated. The surface area of summer sea ice floating in the Arctic Ocean this summer was nearly 23 percent below the previous record. The dwindling sea ice already has affected wildlife, with 6,000 walruses coming ashore in northwest Alaska in October for the first time in recorded history. Another first: the Northwest Passage was open to navigation. Still to be released is NASA data showing the remaining Arctic sea ice to be unusually thin, another record. That makes it more likely to melt in future summers. Combining the shrinking area covered by sea ice with the new thinness of the remaining ice, scientists calculate that the overall volume of ice is half of 2004's total. Alaska's frozen permafrost is warming, not quite thawing yet. But temperature measurements 66 feet deep in the frozen soil rose nearly four-tenths of a degree from 2006 to 2007, according to measurements from the University of Alaska. While that may not sound like much, "it's very significant," said University of Alaska professor Vladimir Romanovsky. Surface temperatures in the Arctic Ocean this summer were the highest in 77 years of record-keeping, with some places 8 degrees Fahrenheit above normal, according to research to be released Wednesday by University of Washington's Michael Steele. Greenland, in particular, is a significant bellwether. Most of its surface is covered by ice. If it completely melted - something key scientists think would likely take centuries, not decades - it could add more than 22 feet to the world's sea level. However, for nearly the past 30 years, the data pattern of its ice sheet melt has zigzagged. A bad year, like 2005, would be followed by a couple of lesser years. According to that pattern, 2007 shouldn't have been a major melt year, but it was, said Konrad Steffen, of the University of Colorado, which gathered the latest data. "I'm quite concerned," he said. "Now I look at 2008. Will it be even warmer than the past year?" Other new data, from a NASA satellite, measures ice volume. NASA geophysicist Scott Luthcke, reviewing it and other Greenland numbers, concluded: "We are quite likely entering a new regime." Melting of sea ice and Greenland's ice sheets also alarms scientists because they become part of a troubling spiral. White sea ice reflects about 80 percent of the sun's heat off Earth, NASA's Zwally said. When there is no sea ice, about 90 percent of the heat goes into the ocean which then warms everything else up. Warmer oceans then lead to more melting. "That feedback is the key to why the models predict that the Arctic warming is going to be faster," Zwally said. "It's getting even worse than the models predicted." NASA scientist James Hansen, the lone-wolf researcher often called the godfather of global warming, on Thursday was to tell scientists and others at the American Geophysical Union scientific in San Francisco that in some ways Earth has hit one of his so-called tipping points, based on Greenland melt data. "We have passed that and some other tipping points in the way that I will define them," Hansen said in an e-mail. "We have not passed a point of no return. We can still roll things back in time - but it is going to require a quick turn in direction." Last year, Cecilia Bitz at the University of Washington and Marika Holland at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado startled their colleagues when they predicted an Arctic free of sea ice in just a few decades. Both say they are surprised by the dramatic melt of 2007. Bitz, unlike others at NASA, believes that "next year we'll be back to normal, but we'll be seeing big anomalies again, occurring more frequently in the future." And that normal, she said, is still a "relentless decline" in ice. Meanwhile, European nations on Thursday threatened to boycott a U.S.-led climate meeting next month unless Washington agrees to a deal mentioning numerical targets for deep reductions in global warming gases. The United Nations warned that time was running out for an agreement aimed at launching negotiations for a successor to the Kyoto Protocol and the talks in Bali were in danger of "falling to pieces." The United States, Japan, Russia and several other governments refuse to accept language in a draft document suggesting that industrialized nations consider cutting emissions by 25 percent to 40 percent by 2020, saying specific targets would limit the scope of future talks. The European Union and others say the figures reflect the measures scientists say are needed to rein in global warming and head off predictions of rising sea levels, worsening floods and droughts, and the extinction of plant and animal species.    Snowmelt In Antarctica Creeping Inland, Based On 20 Year Of NASA Data ScienceDaily (Sep. 24, 2007) — On the world's coldest continent of Antarctica, the landscape is so vast and varied that only satellites can fully capture the extent of changes in the snow melting across its valleys, mountains, glaciers and ice shelves. In a new NASA study, researchers using 20 years of data from space-based sensors have confirmed that Antarctic snow is melting farther inland from the coast over time, melting at higher altitudes than ever and increasingly melting on Antarctica's largest ice shelf. With a surface size about 1.5 times the size of the United States, Antarctica contains 90 percent of Earth's fresh water, making it the largest potential source of sea level rise. It is also a place where snow melting is quite limited because even in summer, most areas typically record temperatures well below zero. Nevertheless, NASA researchers using data collected from 1987 to 2006 found snow melting in unlikely places in 2005: as far inland as 500 miles away from the Antarctic coast and as high as 1.2 miles above sea level in the Transantarctic Mountains. The 20-year data record was three times longer than previous studies and reaffirmed the extreme melting irregularity observed in 2005. During the same period, they also found that melting had increased on the Ross Ice Shelf, both in terms of the geographic area affected and the duration of increased melting across affected areas. "Snow melting is very connected to surface temperature change, so it's likely warmer temperatures are at the root of what we've observed in Antarctica," said lead author Marco Tedesco, a research scientist at the Joint Center for Earth Systems Technology cooperatively managed by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., and the University of Maryland at Baltimore County, Baltimore. The study will be published on Sept. 22 in the American Geophysical Union's Geophysical Research Letters. The Special Sensor Microwave Imager radiometer aboard the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program's satellites provided the researchers an update on previous studies by showing evidence of persistent snow melting -- melting that occurs for at least three days or for one consecutive day and night. As the sensors fly over Antarctica, they measure the radiation naturally emitted by snow and ice at microwave frequencies. Unlike visible sensors, Microwave instruments can also detect melting below the snow surface. "Microwave instruments are very sensitive to wet snow and can see through clouds day and night, allowing us to separate melting from dry snow to better understand when, where and for how long melting took place," said Tedesco. Although the researchers observed less melting in some locations on the continent during the 20-year period, melting increased in others such as the Ross Ice Shelf. Increased snowmelt on the ice shelf surface can lead to melt ponds, with meltwater filling small cracks. The liquid water puts pressure on the cracks causing larger fractures in the ice shelf. "Persistent melting on the Ross Ice Shelf is something we should not lose sight of because of the ice shelf's role as a 'brake system' for glaciers," said Tedesco. "Ice shelves are thick ice masses covering coastal land with extended areas that float on the sea, keeping warmer marine air at a distance from glaciers and preventing a greater acceleration of melting. The Ross Ice Shelf acts like a freezer door, separating ice on the inside from warmer air on the outside. So the smaller that door becomes, the less effective it will be at protecting the ice inside from melting and escaping." The study's results from the satellite data support related research reporting a direct link between changes in near surface air temperatures and the duration and geographic area of snow melting on Antarctica. These studies, when taken together, indicate a relationship to climate change. "Satellites have given us a remarkable ability to monitor the melting trends of glaciers and ice shelves on this immense and largely unknown continent, and to watch for unusual occurrences like those observed in 2005," said co-author Waleed Abdalati, head of the Cryospheric Sciences Branch at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "Through this space-based perspective, we are really only just beginning to understand the nature of the changes that are occurring in Antarctica, and what these changes will mean for Antarctica's future contributions to sea level." Adapted from materials provided by NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center. NASA Finds Vast Regions of West Antarctica Melted in Recent Past 05.15.07 A team of NASA and university scientists has found clear evidence that extensive areas of snow melted in west Antarctica in January 2005 in response to warm temperatures. This was the first widespread Antarctic melting ever detected with NASA's QuikScat satellite and the most significant melt observed using satellites during the past three decades. Combined, the affected regions encompassed an area as big as California. Son Nghiem of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., and Konrad Steffen, director of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado, Boulder, led the team. Using data from QuikScat, they measured snowfall accumulation and melt in Antarctica and Greenland from July 1999 through July 2005. Image right: NASA's QuikScat satellite detected extensive areas of snowmelt, shown in yellow and red, in west Antarctica in January 2005. Image credit: NASA/JPL The observed melting occurred in multiple distinct regions, including far inland, at high latitudes and at high elevations, where melt had been considered unlikely. Evidence of melting was found up to 900 kilometers (560 miles) inland from the open ocean, farther than 85 degrees south (about 500 kilometers, or 310 miles, from the South Pole) and higher than 2,000 meters (6,600 feet) above sea level. Maximum air temperatures at the time of the melting were unusually high, reaching more than five degrees Celsius (41 degrees Fahrenheit) in one of the affected areas. They remained above melting for approximately a week. "Antarctica has shown little to no warming in the recent past with the exception of the Antarctic Peninsula, but now large regions are showing the first signs of the impacts of warming as interpreted by this satellite analysis," said Steffen. "Increases in snowmelt, such as this in 2005, definitely could have an impact on larger-scale melting of Antarctica's ice sheets if they were severe or sustained over time." The satellite's scatterometer instrument sends radar pulses to the ice sheet surface, measuring the echoed pulses that bounce back. When snow melts and then refreezes, it changes to ice, just as ice cream crystallizes when it is left out too long and is then refrozen. QuikScat can differentiate this icy fingerprint in the snow cover and can map on a continental scale the extent of strong snowmelt and the subsequently formed ice layer. Available ground station measurements validate the satellite results. The 2005 melt was intense enough to create an extensive ice layer when water refroze after the melt. However, the melt was not prolonged enough for the melt water to flow into the sea. "Water from melted snow can penetrate into ice sheets through cracks and narrow, tubular glacial shafts called moulins," Steffen said. "If sufficient melt water is available, it may reach the bottom of the ice sheet. This water can lubricate the underside of the ice sheet at the bedrock, causing the ice mass to move toward the ocean faster, increasing sea level." Changes in the ice mass of Antarctica, Earth's largest freshwater reservoir, are important to understanding global sea level rise. Large amounts of Antarctic freshwater flowing into the ocean also could affect ocean salinity, currents and global climate. Nghiem said while no further melting had been detected through March 2007, more monitoring is needed. "Satellite scatterometry is like an X-ray that sees through snow and finds ice layers beneath as early as possible," he said. "It is vital we continue monitoring this region to determine if a long-term trend may be developing." QuikScat data are helping scientists better understand how Antarctica's and Greenland's ice sheets gain or lose mass. "We need to know what's coming in and going out of the ice sheets," Nghiem said. "QuikScat data, combined with data from NASA's IceSat and Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment satellites, along with aircraft and ground measurements, all contribute to more accurate estimates of how the polar ice sheets are changing." The study, "Snow Accumulation and Snowmelt Monitoring in Greenland and Antarctica," appears in the recently published book "Dynamic Planet." ANTARCTIC'S ICE 'MELTING FASTER' From an article on the BBC Web Page at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4228411.stm A team of UK researchers claims to have new evidence that global warming is melting the ice in Antarctica faster than had previously been thought. Scientists from the British Antarctic Survey (Bas) say the rise in sea levels around the world caused by the melting may have been under-estimated. It is thought that over 13,000 sq km of sea ice in the Antarctic Peninsula has been lost over the last 50 years. The findings were announced at a Climate Change Conference in Exeter. Rising sea level Professor Chris Rapley, director of (Bas), told the conference that Antarctica could become a "giant awakened", contributing heavily to rising sea levels. Melting in the Antarctic Peninsula removes sea ice that once held back the movement of glaciers. As a result, glaciers flow into the ocean up to six times faster than before. The other region in the continent affected by the changes is West Antarctica, where warmer sea water is thought to be eroding the ice from underneath. In 2001, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) predicted the average global sea level would rise by between 11cm (4.3in) and 77cm (30.3in) by 2100 - but forecast that Antarctic's contribution would be small. Ice chunks Over the past five years, studies have found that melting Antarctic ice caps contribute at least 15% to the current global sea level rise of 2mm (0.08in) a year. It is not known whether the melting is the result of a natural event or the result of global warming. Professor Rapley said that if this was natural variability, it might be expected to be taking place in only a handful of places. However, studies had shown that it was happening in all three major ice streams in West Antarctica, he added. Several major sections of Antarctic ice have broken off in the past decade. The Larsen A ice shelf, which measured 1,600 sq km, broke off in 1995. The 1,100 sq km Wilkins ice shelf fell off in 1998 and the 13,500 sq km Larsen B dropped away in 2002.     WHATS WRONG WITH DESTROYING THE OZONE AND MELTING ALL THE ICE AT THE POLES? There are some idiots out there who say that we have nothing to really worry about, that global warming can't possibly harm us, that the hole in the ozone over antartica is not a problem since cars and lightning creates ozone, so it will replenish itself.  AND that big business has a right to be excused from polluting since it creates jobs.  AND that it is somehow not right for people to make money from protecting and improving the environment.   Wrong!!! Climate leaves indelible evidence in the geologic record. That means that by carefully studying core samples of ice (the most accurate medium) and earth, we can get a very accurate indication of the climate of the area the core was taken from for the time period the strata corresponds to. Since we can and have studied core samples covering millions of years, it is indeed possible to make reasonable models of how the climate is changing and how our actions as a species are affecting this change. The geologic record shows no other period in earths history when the planet warmed as rapidly as it is now. Yes it has gotten much hotter than this in past ages, but it is the rate of change that is of concern here.  Typically, change occurs over a longer period of time giving nature a chance to adapt and find new ways of maintaining life on the planet. The current rate of change is too fast for this slow process. Maybe nature will make sudden changes to overcome this rapid change, maybe not. Maybe we can survive this and maybe not. Does the earth care if we do or don't? Not really. Do we really want to risk an uncertain future where our children may suffer and not realize the same quality of life we take for granted? Not me. Not when we have alternative means to do the things that currently use materials, which are threatening the future. "Well if the ice melts at the poles, there isn't a problem since when Ice melts, it doesn't raise the level of water.  Simple science rules... " Wow, what high school did you go to? Maybe you were cutting class to smoke Pot the day they taught displacement in science class. Here is a simple experiment for you to try. Yes do this at home. Fill two glasses with ice. Then pour water into one until all the ice floats and the other only half way, with the top of the ice well above the level of the water. With a marker, draw a line at the water level on each glass. Now, cover the top with plastic wrap to prevent evaporation from affecting the results. Leave both glasses on the counter for an hour. When the ice is all melted take a look at the results. The glass that had the floating ice has no change in the water level. The glass where the ice was piled up above the water shows that the water level is above the line. So why is this you may ask? Simple displacement in the case of the floating ice. The ice may have less density than the water but has the same mass. That means that the ice will displace the same volume of water as it will when melted. Why did the water in the other glass rise?  Because not all the ice was in the water. So no displacement occurred. As the ice melted it drained into the water adding to the total volume. This caused the water to rise above the line you drew earlier. In both cases the amount of water in the glass remained the same but the relationship between the water and the ice was different. So how does this apply to the earth and global warming? The ice at the North Pole floats on the water and therefore will have no effect on water levels. But the ice on Greenland and on Antarctica is partly on the land and so isn't fully displacing the water. As it melts it will drain into the ocean just as the ice in the glass that was half filled with water. So you see the overall effect will be a rise in water level. This is Jr. High School science. Next, the Ozone. To start with, the ozone hole is over the South Pole and extends over Australia in their summer. Ozone blocks UV radiation, which damages organic tissue. This ozone is very slow to make. Yes, ozone is created by thunderstorms.  However much of the ozone generated doesn't last very long. In the atmosphere, ozone is short lived. This is why the ozone created by internal combustion engines will not help replenish the ozone layer. It never gets to the upper layers of the atmosphere before breaking down. Since we have alternative means of doing the things we want that will not destroy the ozone, why don't we just use these instead? Also if you were thinking "so what if the ozone disappears we can use sun block or stay indoors," think about this. If the rock a building stands on turns to sand and can no longer support the foundation of the building, the building comes down. Do you want to be on the top floor of this building? You are. We as a species are on the top floor of the building of life. If the plankton in the oceans (especially the Antarctic Ocean) and the bacteria on the soil die, then so too will all life on earth. They are the bottom of the food chain. If they die then the next level dies. Then the next and so on. (plankton die then fish die then we die)  You say you don't like fish?  How about if the bacteria in the soil dies, then the earthworms will die, then insects which live in the soil dies, then small animals which eat the insects die then large insects die then animals which eat the large insects die, then larger animals which eat smaller animals die, then we die.  You say you are a vegetarian?  The nitrogen fixing bacteria in the soil dies, the bacteria which helps earthworms live, dies, the bacteria that breaks down vegetation and returns it to rebuild the soil, dies, eventually the vegetation becomes sterile and the vegetation leaches all the nitrogen out of the soil.  All vegetarians, frutarians, lacto vegetarians, and omnivores will die if the ozone disappears. There is neither sun block to prevent that nor any indoor facility big enough to protect these most essential members of the building of life. And what's wrong with people making a buck on environmentalism? Are you some kind of Nut!!? You think it's ok for Big Business to make money from destroying the environment, but working to curb its destruction should be done for free?    If I come up with another way of doing something and can make a buck from it, then that is capitalism. If it helps save the world, wonderful! Who has any right to condemn my motivation for the product?" Melting Ice to Hit People Worldwide Monday Jun 4 2007 Global warming that is melting ice and snow will affect hundreds of millions of people around the globe by disrupting rivers in Asia, thawing Arctic ice and raising ocean levels, a UN report said. Glaciers from the Himalayas to the Alps are in retreat, permafrost from Alaska to Siberia is warming and snowfalls are becoming unreliable in many regions, according to a Global Outlook for Ice and Snow written by more than 70 experts.   And it said the changes, widely blamed on greenhouse gases released by mankind's use of fossil fuels, would be felt far from polar regions or high mountain areas. "Fate of the world's snowy and icy places as a result of climate change should be cause for concern in every ministry, boardroom and living room across the world," said Achim Steiner, head of UN Environment Program of the 238-page report. He said the findings were relevant "from Berlin to Brasilia, and Beijing to Boston". The report said that about 40 per cent of the world's 6.5 billion population would be affected by retreating glaciers in Asia - snow and ice in the Himalayas, for instance, help regulate river flows and irrigation from China to India.   And a one-metre rise in world sea levels, linked to expansion of the oceans as they warm and melt from glaciers, could cause almost $US950 billion ($A1.15 trillion) in damage and expose 145 million people to flooding, it said. Oceans rose by almost 20cm last century and UN studies project a further rise of 18-59cm by 2100. Asia would be hard hit by rising seas, especially low-lying Bangladesh, the report said.  The snow and ice report was released on the eve of World Environment Day, and two days before a June 6-8 summit by the leaders of the world's top eight industrial powers in Germany. "The world cannot afford simply to discuss climate change.  It has to act," Steiner said. The report said there were big uncertainties about the fate of ice on Greenland and Antarctica, the world's main stores of fresh water.   Greenland contains enough ice to raise sea levels by 7 metres, Antarctica by about 60 metres. And less snow is falling in many areas, with a 1.3 per cent decline per decade since the 1960s in the northern hemisphere.  A one degree Celsius temperature rise would raise the snow line in the Alps by 150 metres, for instance, damaging ski resorts and tourism. And lifestyles were already changing. Hunters in Qeqertarsuaq in western Greenland were turning to use motorboats rather than dogsleds because the sea ice was no longer solid.  Polar bears are among animals under threat from shrinking ice. The report said the rise in temperatures "has not yet resulted in widespread permafrost thawing." Even so, the report said the quantity of methane being released from permafrost in Siberia may already be five times more than previously supposed.  Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas stored in vast quantities in permafrost. Among benefits from melting ice, a northern sea route along the coast of Russia could be open for 120 days a year by 2100 against 30 now. And the report pointed to dangers of abrupt floods linked to a melting of glaciers that have blocked lakes.  In 1998 a so-called glacier lake outburst flood killed more than 100 people in Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. ©AAP 2007 Big area of Antarctica melted in '05, study finds Water later refroze, but incident seen as potential warning signal   NASA/JPL via AFP-Getty Images This satellite-based image of Antarctica shows areas in red and yellow that were found to have warmed significantly in January 2005. May 16, 2007 Extensive areas of snow melted in west Antarctica in January 2005 in response to warm temperatures, researchers reported in a new study, describing the melt as "the most significant" ever observed in the 30 years satellites have been used to track such changes. The affected areas encompass a combined area as big as California. "Antarctica has shown little to no warming in the recent past with the exception of the Antarctic Peninsula, but now large regions are showing the first signs of the impacts of warming as interpreted by this satellite analysis," study co-leader Konrad Steffen said in a statement. "Increases in snowmelt, such as this in 2005, definitely could have an impact on larger scale melting of Antarctica's ice sheets if they were severe or sustained over time," added Steffen, director of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado, Boulder. About 90 percent of the world's fresh water is locked in the thick ice sheets that cover west and east Antarctica. If just the smaller west sheet melts, scientists estimate it could cause a 15-foot rise in world sea levels. Even a three-foot sea level rise could cause havoc in coastal and low-lying areas around the globe, according to a recent World Bank study. The team used a NASA satellite to measure snowfall accumulation and melt in Antarctica and Greenland from July 1999 through July 2005. The satellite sent radar pulses to the ice, measuring the echoed pulses that bounce back. That data was compared over time to detect changes. Ground station measurements validated the satellite results. Odd areas of melt In a statement, NASA said that the melt was widespread, "including far inland, at high latitudes and at high elevations, where melt had been considered unlikely. Evidence of melting was found up to 560 miles inland from the open ocean, farther than 85 degrees south (about 310 miles from the South Pole) and higher than 6,600 feet above sea level." The areas included a vast stretch of the Ross Ice Shelf abutting the Transantarctic Mountain range. That shelf is the size of Texas and would lead to major glacier flows into the ocean were it to collapse. That melt area is right at the border between the ice shelf and the mountain, it's kind of like a hinge," study co-leader Son Nghiem of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., told msnbc.com. "If that hinge is weakened it might have a dynamic effect on the ice shelf. It's still a hypothesis, but it's something we have to look into." Referring to the overall melting, NASA added that "maximum air temperatures at the time of the melting were unusually high, reaching more than 41 F in one of the affected areas. They remained above melting for approximately a week" in January, which is the height of the Southern Hemisphere's summer. The 2005 melt was not long enough for the melt water to flow into the ocean but it did create an extensive ice layer when water refroze after the melt. And some of that melt water is thought too have made its way through ice cracks, possibly affecting how ice sheets move. "Water from melted snow can penetrate into ice sheets through cracks and narrow, tubular glacial shafts called moulins," Steffen said. "If sufficient melt water is available, it may reach the bottom of the ice sheet. This water can lubricate the underside of the ice sheet at the bedrock, causing the ice mass to move toward the ocean faster, increasing sea level." Call for more studies While no further melting had been detected through March 2007, the researchers said it could well happen again. "It is vital we continue monitoring this region to determine if a long-term trend may be developing," Nghiem said. "We need to know what's coming in and going out of the ice sheets." The peer-reviewed study, "Snow accumulation and snowmelt monitoring in Greenland and Antarctica," appears in the just published book "Dynamic Planet." Interactives Carbon trade game Learn how the "cap and trade" scheme works and play along in a simulated market. The greenhouse effect How the Earth maintains a temperature conducive to life Cooling the planet Check out five far-out ideas on how to engineer a cooler Earth. Eyeing the ice The National Science Foundation's Tom Wagner on why climate experts study Antarctica Capturing CO2 A look at carbon sequestration Melting mountains Data shows five areas of concern Greenest and meanest vehicles 2007 vehicle models by their “green scores.” Energy map of America A look at where the nation gets its energy

Pollution Adds To Global Warming

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS | Filed 10/26/2000
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The past five years has produced still stronger evidence that human activities are influencing climate and that the earth is likely to get hotter than previously predicted, a U.N. panel of climate scientists says.

The conclusions by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the most authoritative scientific voice on global warming, is expected to unleash new controversy as scientists and governments debate the earth's climate in the coming decade.

The report's summary, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press, was distributed to government officials worldwide this week and will be fine-tuned at a meeting of world government representatives early next year.

While some wording will change, the panel's scientific findings cannot be altered, several participants in crafting the summary report said.

It is the first full-scale review and update of the state of climate science by the IPCC panel since 1995 when the same group concluded there is ``a discernible human influence'' on the earth's climate -- the so-called ``greenhouse'' effect caused by the buildup of heat-trapping chemicals in the atmosphere.

While there remain uncertainties, studies of the last five years and more sophisticated computer modeling shows ``there is now stronger evidence for a human influence'' on the climate and more certainty that man-made greenhouse gases ``have contributed substantially to the observed warming over the last 50 years.''

``What this report is clearly saying is that global warming is a real problem and it is with us and we are going to have to take this into account in our future planning,'' said Kevin Trenberth, head of climate analysis section at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo.

Equally significant, is the conclusion in the new assessment that if greenhouse emissions are not curtailed the earth's average surface temperatures could be expected to increase substantially more than previously estimated.

The panel concluded that average global temperature increases ranging from 2.7 to as much as 11 degrees Fahrenheit can be expected by the end of this century if current trends of concentration of heat-trapping gases continues unabated in the atmosphere.

Five years ago, the panel put the projected increases at a range 1.8 to 6.3 degrees Fahrenheit. The panel said the higher temperatures stem mainly from more sophisticated computer modeling and expected decline in sulfate releases into the atmosphere, especially from power plants for other environmental reasons. These sulfates tend to act as a cooling agent by reflecting the sun's radiation.

Michael Oppenheimer, an atmospheric physicist at Environmental Defense, said the new warming estimates pose ``a risk of devastating consequences within this century.''

A co-author of the full report, he said he could only discuss it in general terms since it has yet to be released.

The findings were the product of several hundred climate scientists including -- like Oppenheimer -- longtime proponents of global warming as well as skeptics who say there remain significant uncertainties.

Michael Schlesinger, a climatologist at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana, who also contributed to the report, emphasized in an interview that there is still insufficient knowledge about natural climate variables such as solar radiation that could influence any assessment on human impact on climate.

Three years ago industrial nations tentatively agreed to curtail the release of greenhouse gases -- mainly carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels -- to below 1990 levels as a first step to address global warming. None of the major industrial emitters has yet to ratify the treaty.

The IPCC panel's 1995 summary represented the key scientific underpinning for the Kyoto accord. Likewise the new assessment, reflecting the most current scientific understanding of the climate system and potential for future warming, will be key to the coming decade's climate debate.

``An increasing body of observations gives a collective picture of warming world,'' the scientists determined.

Half of Indonesia's Coral Reefs Dead!!!

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS  |  Filed 10/24/2000
NUSA DUA, Indonesia (AP) -- Half of the once vast coral reefs that surrounded the world's largest archipelago have been lost and international aid is needed to save the rest, Indonesia said Tuesday.

Maritime Affairs Minister Sarwono Kusmaatmadja said the government was so distracted with crises such as separatist and religious violence that it lacked the time and resources to protect the reefs, which make up 14 percent of the world's coral.

``We need assistance from other countries, such as patrol boats and scholarships for our scientists,'' he said.

The reefs bring in hundreds of millions of dollars every year in fishing and tourism revenues needed in Indonesia's battle against its worst financial crisis in a generation.

Kusmaatmadja told hundreds of scientists at an international coral reef symposium said that many reefs had been devastated by poor fishing practices, including the use of explosives and poisons.

However, industrialized countries must also accept responsibility for damage caused by global warming, he said.

Scientists at meeting on the island of Bali have said that an increase in ocean and sea temperatures is largely to blame for much reef destruction around the world.

Unless drastic steps are taken to reverse the warming trend and curb pollution, all reefs will be dead within 20 years, they said.

Three giant icebergs have broken off the Ronne Ice Shelf in Antarctica and are adrift, the National Ice Center reported Wednesday:   05-10-2000

WASHINGTON  — ICEBERG A-43 was detected by satellite on May 5, having broken free May 4.  Iceberg A-44 broke loose May 6, at about the same time as A-43 broke in half, forming A-43A and A-43B.  The center said A-43A measures 107 miles by 21 miles; A-43B is 53 miles by 23 miles and A-44 is 41 miles by 20 miles.  When an iceberg is first sighted, the National Ice Center in Suitland, Md., documents its point of origin and assigns a letter, dividing Antarctica into quadrants. For example, A-44 is the 44th iceberg the ice center has found in quadrant A, which is the area due south of South America.  The ice center is a joint activity of the Navy, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Coast Guard.

Cracks Discovered in Ocean Floor: 05-02-2000


FALMOUTH, Mass. (AP) -- Scientists have discovered cracks in the ocean floor off the East Coast that they say could trigger a tsunami, sending 18-foot waves toward the mid-Atlantic states.

In this month's issue of the journal Geology, the three researchers say they discovered the cracks along a 25-mile section of the continental shelf off the Virginia and North Carolina coasts.

Those areas and the lower Chesapeake Bay would be at the highest risk for wave heights similar to the storm surge of a category 4 hurricane,   which is characterized by top sustained winds of 131 mph to 155 mph.

Neal Driscoll of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution on Cape Cod, Jeffrey Weissel of Columbia University and John Goff of the University of Texas said the recently discovered cracks could mean the  continental shelf is unstable.

The cracks indicate the sea floor could slide down like an avalanche, triggering giant waves. It's unclear whether the cracks are fossil features or whether they are still active, Driscoll said.

The scientists plan an expedition this weekend to gather more information  to better determine the risk to the coast.

``The threat, if they haven't moved in a long time, might be less,'' Driscoll said.

He said there is evidence that a tsunami, a massive wave caused by an earthquake or volcanic eruption, occurred 16,000 to 18,000 years ago.

A tsunami in Papua New Guinea killed 2,000 people in 1998.


On the Net: Abstract of article at journal site: http://www.geosociety.org/pubs/geology/0500geo.htmS6

Amphibians Declining Worldwide: 04-13-2000

In the largest such study to date, researchers reported today that the world's frogs, toads and other amphibians are disappearing, and the decline began long before scientists first sounded the alarm in the 1980s.

Researchers reported that overall numbers of amphibians dropped 15 percent each year from 1960 to 1966, and continued to decline about 2 percent annually through 1997.

Coincidently, that's when scientists first started seeing a noticible change in the greenhouse gases in our atmosphere as well as a thinning of the ozone layer over the south pole.  A good portion of the plankton in the sea lives in a rich "soup" around  antartica.

``This should put the last nail in the coffin for anyone who doesn't think there are some population declines for amphibians,'' said Andrew Blaustein, a professor of zoology at Oregon State University.

The findings, published in today's issue of the journal Nature, were compiled by a University of Ottawa researcher, using Internet contacts with some 200 scientists around the world.

Since the late 1980s, scientists have been concerned about catastrophic declines in populations of frogs, toads, salamanders and other amphibian species, particularly in Australia, South America, Central America and high-altitude regions of the American West.

Because they are more vulnerable than many other creatures, amphibians are considered a ``canary in the coal mine'' for environmental damage.

Scientists have yet to zero in the causes but suspect a combination of factors: loss of wetlands to development; use of fertilizers and pesticides; increased ultraviolet light from an ozone layer thinned by industrial pollutants; and the introduction of exotic predators.

``It's just society doing its thing,'' said Michael Lannoo, a professor of anatomy at the Indiana University School of Medicine.

The study was initiated by Jeff Houlahan, a Ph.D candidate in biology. 

``By and large the evidence has been anecdotal. No one had ever quantitatively tried to say is there truly a global decline,'' Houlahan said.  ``I thought the best way to do that was simply to pile the data up as high as you can get it and see what it tells you.''

Houlahan gleaned studies from obscure scientific journals and combed university Web sites for the names of scientists studying amphibians, then e-mailed them to ask if they had data to share. He contacted more scientists through Froglog, the Internet newsletter of the Declining Amphibian Population Taskforce of the World Conservation Union's Species Survival Commission.

Data on 936 populations of amphibians and 157 species came in from 37 countries and eight regions of the world.

``We could not have done this without the Internet,'' Houlahan said.

Trends varied by time and place. In Western Europe, a sharp decline in the early 1960s leveled off later. In North America, the decline was slower, but steady. There was not enough data to fully analyze trends in South America, Africa and Australia.

Houlahan acknowledged that amphibians traditionally have gone through periodic booms to overcome regular population declines. But he said the analyses found overall that the booms are not overcoming the declines.

On the Net:

Froglog: http://www2.open.ac.uk/biology/froglog/froglog.html

North American Amphibian Monitoring Program: http://www.im.nbs.gov/amphibs.html

Greenland Glacier Warming Feared:   04-06-2000

Worried about the effects of global warming, scientists watching for signs of melting now say a key threat comes from glaciers in Greenland.

Scientists fear that a rise in the Earth's average temperature could make the oceans rise and swamp low-lying coastal cities in the coming century.

New research suggests that Antarctica's second-largest ice sheet is more stable than had been believed. The glaciers of Greenland, more than 9,000 miles to the north, are more likely to melt with dire consequences as Earth warms up, said Kurt Cuffey, a geographer at the University of California, Berkeley.

The findings are reported in today's issue of the journal Nature.

``If nothing is done to stabilize our climate and sea levels rise as much as 6 meters (20 feet), you'll flood the southern half of Florida, the southern half of Louisiana. A 2-degree global warming doesn't sound like much, but you have to realize the consequences can be really quite disastrous,'' said Cuffey, the study's co-author.

A United Nations-sponsored panel predicts that average global temperatures will rise 2 to 6 degrees in the next 100 years if current greenhouse gas emissions are not curtailed.

For their study, Cuffey and colleagues extracted ice cores from Greenland's ice sheet to look for clues to the last ``interglacial period'' -- a warm period 110,000 to 130,000 years ago that preceded the last ice age.

They found evidence that much of Greenland's ice melted during that balmy interlude, and calculated that the massive Greenland meltoff accounted for nearly all of the rise in sea levels around the globe during that time. They concluded that the melt from the West Antarctic ice sheet was comparatively negligible.

Greenland covers 840,000 square miles, 85 percent of which is covered by ice up to 2 miles thick. Its ice sheet is particularly vulnerable to ice melt because it is closer to the equator than the West Antarctic ice sheet at the South Pole.

Cuffey and co-author Shawn Marshall of the University of British Columbia estimate that Greenland's meltwater raised ocean levels 13 to 20 feet and inundated coastal regions worldwide during the last
interglacial period.

The researchers also dropped thermometers into the holes created by their ice drilling operations and took the temperature of the ice sheet's deep interior.

They found that temperatures in central Greenland during the last interglacial period were 8 to 15 degrees warmer than had been estimated, offering additional evidence that much of the ice sheet melted
during that period.

The team's findings fit with other evidence, including a lack of old ice near the bottom of some parts of Greenland's ice sheet, said Richard Alley, a professor of geosciences at Pennsylvania State University.

``I think this accounts for most or all of the high sea levels during the previous warm period,'' Alley said. ``It's not absolutely certain, but I think the evidence is good.''

Although the findings suggest that the West Antarctic ice sheet was stable during Earth's last warm period, scientists can't predict what will happen now that human activity has disrupted Earth's natural cycles and accelerated atmospheric warming, said Jim White, a professor of geological sciences at the University of Colorado.

He agrees that Greenland could be the more immediate threat but says the possible long-term role of melting in Antarctica is still unclear.

On the Net:

Cuffey's home page:
http://www-geography.berkeley.edu/People/faculty/K--Cuffey.html

National Science Foundation's polar programs page:
http://www.nsf.gov/od/opp

Study: World's Oceans Warming: 03-24-2000

By The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The oceans have warmed significantly over the past four decades, providing new evidence that the Earth may be undergoing long-term climate change, a study by government scientists says.

The broad study of temperature data from the oceans shows average temperatures have increased from one-tenth to one-half degree, depending on depth since the 1950s, an amount described as surprising. 

The findings, reported Thursday by scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, also may support the findings of computer climate models that suggest more severe temperature increases than are shown by actual historic surface temperature readings.

The computer models have produced temperature increases that are larger than those observed by surface and atmospheric monitors, prompting skeptics of global warming to say such modeling -- when used to predict future climate changes -- exaggerates the threat.

But the NOAA study has uncovered significant warming over the past 40 years in the oceans in depths of as much as 10,000 feet, suggesting this ``missing heat'' -- as one scientist characterized it -- may explain the difference between the computer simulations and actual readings.

``We've known the oceans could absorb heat, transport it to subsurface depths and isolate it from the atmosphere. Now we see evidence that this is happening,'' said Sydney Levitus, chief of NOAA's Ocean Climate Laboratory and principal author of the study.

Levitus and fellow scientists, who have worked on the project for seven years, examined temperature data from more than 5 million readings at various depths in the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian oceans, from 1948 to 1996.

They found the Pacific and Atlantic oceans have been warming since the mid-1950s, and the Indian Ocean since the early 1960s, according to the study published today in the journal Science.

The greatest warming occurred from the surface to a depth of about 900 feet, where the average heat content increased by 0.56 degrees Fahrenheit. Water as far down as 10,000 feet was found to have gained on average 0.11 degrees Fahrenheit.

``This is one of the surprising things. We've found half of the warming occurred below 1,000 feet,'' Levitus said in an interview. ``It brings the climate debate to a new level. We can no longer ignore the ocean.''

Jim Hansen, director of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, said the expected warming of the Earth from so-called ``greenhouse'' gas emissions ``would tend to give you a warming of the oceans of that magnitude.''

``It confirms that the earth is heating up,'' said Hansen, who was among the earliest proponents of the argument that heat-trapping manmade pollution -- greenhouse gases, mainly carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels -- in the atmosphere is causing Earth to become warmer.

The study did not pinpoint the cause of the ocean warming trend over such a lengthy period, but said both natural and human-induced causes were likely.   ``Our results support climate modeling predictions that show increasing atmospheric greenhouse gases will have a relatively large warming influence on the Earth's atmosphere,'' said Levitus.

He discounted short-term climate phenomenon such as the El Nino effect as a significant factor, adding: ``We're seeing a 35-year warming trend and El Nino occurs on a time scale of two to seven years. There's something much more significant occurring than just short-term
variability.''

A U.N.-sponsored panel of more than 200 scientists has predicted that average global temperatures will increase 2 degrees to 6 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of the century if current greenhouse gas emissions are not curtailed. The Earth has warmed about 1 degree Fahrenheit over the last 100 years, according to scientists.

The panel's predicted future warming is believed by many scientists to have broad economic and environmental impact including sea level rise as well as changes in agriculture and human health.

``It is possible that ocean heat content may be an early indicator of the warming of surface, air and sea surface temperatures more than a decade (from now),'' said Levitus.

Antarctic Melting Blamed on Global Warming: 10-01-1999

Detectable climatic change seems to be occurring in the central and southern parts of the west coast of the Antarctic Peninsula. Climate records from this region extend back 50 years and, over this period, annual mean temperatures have risen by about 2oC - a far larger rise than seen elsewhere in the Southern Hemisphere.   Although climate model predictions do indicate an enhanced response to future global warming in some parts of the polar regions, the Antarctic Peninsula is not one of these areas. The lack of a clear modelled association between Peninsula warming and global warming means that it is premature to attribute warming in the Peninsula to an enhanced "greenhouse" effect. 

However, climate models are currently unable to reproduce the warming observed over the past 50 years in the Peninsula (while they simulate global changes over this period quite well). Given this weakness in current model performance, future climate scenarios for the region must be treated with some caution and a link between Peninsula warming and the enhanced "greenhouse" effect cannot be ruled out completely at present.

Whatever the case, we know that the climate of the region is highly sensitive as a result of complex interactions between atmosphere, oceans and sea-ice and studying it can tell us much about polar climate processes. Recent research also shows that the climate of this region is strongly influenced by climate variations in the subtropical and tropical South Pacific, such as those associated with El Nino - Southern Oscillation (ENSO). While such "teleconnections" are responsible for much of the short-term variability in climate seen in this region, their role in driving longer term (decadal to century scale) change remains to be clarified.

The observed warming has already had a significant impact in the region and is believed to have caused the disintegration of both the Wordie Ice Shelf and the northern part of the Larsen Ice Shelf. Warmer conditions in recent years have also led to increased colonisation by plants at certain sites in the region.

Changes have also occurred in the upper atmosphere over Antarctica. Measurements made over the Antarctic Peninsula and the Falkland Islands show that the level of peak electron concentration in the ionospheric F-region (at about 300 km  altitude) has fallen by about 8 km over 38 years. Unlike the surface temperature trends, these changes can be attributed to increased greenhouse gas concentrations with some level of confidence. While the lower atmosphere warms in response to increasing concentrations of greenhouse gasses, the upper atmosphere cools. Theoretical studies indicate that the observed fall in the height of the F-region is compatible with expected temperature changes in the thermosphere.

Winter sea-ice has been shrinking in the Antarctic area. Measurements taken between 1973 and 1988 show a decrease in sea-ice extent of around 33 kilometers per decade [13].

While some researchers maintain that warming temperatures will result in an expansion of some glaciers, at least in the short to medium term [14], BAS scientists working at Faraday Station, Galindez Island, in the Antarctic Peninsula, report that the thickness of the ice cap on the island has diminished by one metre between 1973 and 1988 [15]. Glacial retreat has also reportedly accelerated on other glaciated sub-Antarctic islands in recent decades [16].

Footnotes:
13. Jacka, T.H. (1990) "Antarctica and southern ocean sea-ice and climate trends," Annals of Glaciology, v. 14, 1990.

14. Domack, E.W., Jull, A.J.T. & Nakao, S., "Advance of East Antarctic outlet glaciers during the Hypsithermal: Implications for the volume set
of the Antarctic Ice Sheet under global warming", {Geology}, vol.1033, p.1059-1062, 1991.

15. {World Climate News}, World Meteorological Organisation, no.4, January 1994.

16. Chittleborough, R.G., "Potential impacts of climatic change on southern ocean ecosystems," {Memoirs of the Queensland Museum}, vol.30, p.243-247, 1991.

Arctic Melting Blamed on Warming 12/03/1999

WASHINGTON (AP) - The giant arctic ice cap may be melting as a result of global warming, according to a new paper by an international team of researchers.

An analysis using complex computer programs that mimic the climate system indicates only a 2 percent chance that arctic melting over the last 19 years is a result of natural climate changes, according to the paper appearing in Friday's edition of the journal Science.

Also, there only is a 0.1 percent chance that the melting over the last 46 years is natural, according to the team led by Konstantin Vinnikov of the University of Maryland.

In recent years scientists increasingly have become concerned about the possibility that chemicals released into the atmosphere by industry are causing the climate to warm, though some contend that the changes are part of natural variability.

Vinnikov's team concentrated on satellite measurements of sea ice in the Arctic taken since 1978, showing an overall decline in ice area larger than the state of Texas.

Since the ice is floating, the melting does not affect sea levels.

They used computers in Princeton, N.J., and at the Hadley Center in Britain to calculate the probable normal changes in the Earth's atmosphere over long periods.

They then studied computer simulations that include greenhouse gas increases, tending to warm the atmosphere, and aerosol increases, tending to cool the atmosphere.

The model results with these human-induced changes included were a much better match with the observed sea ice decreases than the model results simulating natural variability.

The result, the team reports, ``strongly suggests that the observed decrease in northern hemisphere sea ice extent is related to (human caused) global warming.''

The probability that melting under normal conditions would equal that over the last 19 years was less than 2 percent, they said, and the likelihood that it would equal that over the last 46 years was under 0.1 percent.

In addition to the University of Maryland, participating in the study were researchers at Rutgers University, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the University of Illinois, NASA, the Hadley Center in Great Britain and the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute in Russia.

Time Running Out For Ecology, Report Warns; New Threat Is Found: 09-22-1999

By Rosalind Russell, Reuters, 09/22/99

NAIROBI - It is too late to halt global warming and time is quickly running out to prevent other potential environmental catastrophes, the UN's environment agency said in a major report yesterday.

''Global Environment Outlook 2000'' offers a gloomy view of the planet's condition on the eve of the next millennium. It points to new threats - such as increased levels of nitrogen in the water supply - that the world has not yet tackled.

''The gains made by better management and technology are still being outpaced by the environmental impacts of population and economic growth. We are on an unsustainable course,'' Klaus Toepfer, head of the United Nations Environment Program, said at the launch of the report in Nairobi.

The report says emissions of greenhouse gases that cause global warming have quadrupled since the 1950s, and that ''binding'' targets to reduce emissions, agreed by governments at the summit last year in Kyoto, Japan, may not be met.

The rate at which humans are destroying the environment is accelerating, often because of excessive consumption by the rich, and to the detriment of the poor.

About 20 percent of the world's population lack access to safe drinking water, and 50 percent have no access to a sanitation system. This state of affairs will deteriorate as the world's population, set to reach 6 billion next month, will increase by 50 percent in the next 50 years.

Eighty percent of the world's original forest cover has been cleared or degraded, and logging and mining projects threaten 39 percent of what forest remains.

A quarter of mammal species are at risk of extinction, while more than half the world's coral reefs are threatened by human activity.

There were 850 contributors to the report, which took two and a half years to compile, and which highlights some lesser-known environmental problems.

Disasters such as hurricanes and forest fires are increasing in frequency and severity, and have killed 3 million people in the past three decades. Armed conflicts and refugee flows are causing greater damage to the environment than ever before.

There is also mounting evidence that humans are seriously destabilizing the global nitrogen balance. Huge amounts of nitrogen are being deposited on land and in water through intensive agriculture and the burning of fossil fuels.

Eventually, this problem could make fresh-water supplies unfit for human consumption, the report says.

''The full extent of the damage is only now becoming apparent as we begin to piece together a comprehensive overview of the extremely complex, interconnected web that is our life support system,'' said Toepfer, a former German environment minister.

Much of the damage is irreparable, but through a huge mobilization of resources and political will, much can be done to prevent further destruction, the report says.

A long-term target of a 90 percent reduction in the consumption of raw materials in industrialized countries may seem far-fetched, but without it hundreds of millions of people will be condemned to a life of suffering, the report concludes.

This story ran on page A05 of the Boston Globe on 09/22/99.

© Copyright 1999 Globe Newspaper Company.

Summary of reports from the Union of Concerned Scientists

Human culture now has the potential to inflict irreversible damage on the environment and on its life sustaining systems and resources. Already, critical stress suffered by our environment is clearly manifest in the air, water, and soil, our climate, and plant and animal species. Should this deterioration be allowed to continue, we can expect to alter the living world to the extent that it will be unable to sustain life as we know it.

Indiscriminate dumping of toxic, nuclear, and biomedical waste and environmental disasters of enormous scale have begun to cut deep scars into the Earth's ecosystem and disrupt its delicate ecological balance. Global warming, though to be resulting from increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from fossil fuel use and from deforestation, may have the potential to alter climate on a massive scale. Air pollution near ground level and acid precipitation, and stratospheric ozone depletion causing enhanced ultra-violet radiation at the earth's surface, are causing widespread injury to human and animal populations, forests and crops. Our remaining rainforests and many wild forest regions, essential to worldwide ecological balance, are slated for clear cutting due to poor management policies. 

Uncontrolled exploitation of depletable ground water supplies have endangered food production and other essential human systems and heavy demands for surface waters have resulted in serious shortages in many countries. Pollution of rivers, lakes and ground water has further limited the supply of potable water.   Destructive pressure on the oceans is severe. Rivers carrying heavy burdens of eroded soil into the seas also contain toxic industrial, municipal, agricultural, and livestock waste. With the marine catch at or above the maximum sustainable yield, some fisheries are already showing signs of collapse.

Soil productivity is on the decline and per capita food production in many parts of the world is decreasing, as a result of destructive agriculture and animal husbandry practices.   Already, more than ten percent of the earth's vegetated surface has been degraded, an area larger than India and China combined.

Over one third of the valuable topsoil used to grow the grains that feed much of the world has blown or washed away. This desertification, caused by overgrazing domestic animals and by over-cultivation, salinization, and deforestation, has already impacted over 35 percent of the land surface of the earth (United Nations Environmental Program). Desertification has caused many millions to abandon the land, lacking the bare essentials of survival, they have migrated to urban slums, where all that awaits them are meager government relief packages and poverty wages.

We are fast approaching many of the earth's limits; its ability to provide for growing numbers of people, to provide food and energy, and to absorb wastes and destructive effluent. Current economic practices which damage the environment, in both developed and underdeveloped nations, cannot be continued without the risk that vital global systems will be damaged beyond repair.

No more than a few decades remain before the chance to avert the threats we now confront will be lost and the prospects for humanity immeasurably diminished. We must begin to bring environmentally damaging activities under control to restore and protect the integrity of the earth's ecosystems. The greatest peril is to become trapped in spirals of environmental decline, poverty, and unrest, leading to worldwide social, economic and environmental collapse from which we may be unable to recover.

Most Recent State of the Earth Report from the United Nations Environment Programme

"From a global perspective the environment has continued to degrade during the past decade, and significant environmental problems remain deeply embedded in the socio-economic fabric of nations in all regions. Progress towards a global sustainable future is just too slow. A sense of urgency is lacking.  Internationally and nationally, the funds and political will are insufficient to halt further global environmental degradation and to address the most pressing environmental issues-even though technology and knowledge are available to do so.

The recognition of environmental issues as necessarily long-term and cumulative, with serious global and security implications, remains limited. The reconciliation of environment and trade regimes in a fair and equitable mannerstill remains a major challenge. The continued preoccupation with immediate local and national issues and a general lack of sustained interest in global and long-term environmental issues remain major impediments to environmental progress internationally. Global governance structures and global environmental solidarity remain too weak to make progress a world-wide reality. As a result,
the gap between what has been done thus far and what is realistically needed is widening.

Comprehensive response mechanisms have not yet been fully internalized at the national level. The development at local, national, and regional levels of effective environmental legislation and of fiscal and economic instruments has not kept pace with the increase in environmental institutions. In the private sector, environmental advances by several major transnational corporations are not reflected widely in the practices of small- and medium-sized companies that form the backbone of economies in many countries.

In the future, the continued degradation of natural resources, shortcomings in environmental responses, and renewable resource constraints may increasingly lead to food insecurity and conflict situations. Changes in global biogeochemical cycles and the complex interactions between environmental problems such as climate change, ozone depletion, and acidification may have impacts that will confront local, regional, and global communities with situations they are unprepared for. Previously unknown risks to human health are becoming evident from the cumulative and persistent effects of a whole range of chemicals, particularly the persistent organic pollutants. The effects of climate variability and change are already increasing the incidence of familiar public health problems and leading to new ones, including a more extensive reach of vectorborne diseases and a higher incidence of heat-related illness and mortality. If significant major policy reforms are not implemented quickly, the future might hold more such surprises.

GEO-1 substantiates the need for the world to embark on major structural changes and to pursue environmental and associated socio-economic policies vigorously. Key areas for action must embrace the use of alternative and renewableenergy resources, cleaner and leaner production systems world-wide, and concerted global action for the protection and conservation of the world's finite and irreplaceable fresh-water resources."

From B.F. Skinner, 1971 (via Uri Cogan)

"In trying to solve the terrifying problems that face us in the world today, we naturally turn to the things we do best. We play from strength, and our strength is science and technology. To contain a population explosion we look for better methods of birth control. Threatened by a nuclear holocaust, we build bigger deterrent forces and anti-ballistic-missile systems. We try to stave off world famine with new foods and better ways of growing them. Improved sanitation and medicine will, we hope, control disease, better housing and transportation will solve the problems of the ghettos, and new ways of reducing or disposing of waste will stop the pollution of the environment. We can point to remarkable achievements in all these fields, and it is not surprising that we should try to extend them. But things grow steadily worse and it is disheartening to find that technology itself is increasingly at fault. Sanitation and medicine have made the problems of population more acute, war has acquired a new horror with the invention of nuclear weapons, and the affluent pursuit of happiness is largely responsible for pollution. As Darlington has said, 'Every new source from which man has increased his power on the earth has been used to diminish the prospects of his successors. All his progress has been made at the expense of damage to his environment which he cannot repair and could not forsee."

Warming Trend is Ominous!  8/3/1999

Washington, D.C.  Global warming is rapidly melting the ice sheet at the North Pole, threatening to unleash more extreme weather patterns, Vice President Al Gore said Monday.

Michael Ledbetter, a national Science Foundation expert on Arctic systems said, "The one thing we know for sure is that if the ice melts, the heat balance between the equator and the poles will change dramatically."

Some of the viruses detected in coastal waters are linked with heart disease, diabetes, meningitis and hepatitis.   “Most people who come in contact with these viruses do not get ill,” she said. But of the 20 to 24 percent who do, about 1 percent become chronically infected, she said.