Signs From Earth

James Hansen's new climate site: "What Path is the Real World Following?" (& @guardianeco op-ed) #COP15

Global Temperature: From: http://www.columbia.edu/~mhs119/Temperature/ and http://www.columbia.edu/~mhs119/UpdatedFigures/UpdatesFig12.pdf )

Dr. James Hansen of NASA Goddard Institute of Space studies (GISS) and Columbia University continues his work to influence public opinion and policy action on climate change. In collaboration with colleague Makiko Sato he is building a new website, "Updating the Climate Science: What Path is the Real World Following?" to help people understand global climate change and how the factors that drive it are changing:

http://www.columbia.edu/~mhs119/

"Our aim is to help people understand global climate change -- and how the factors that drive climate are changing. Such knowledge may help people assess whether it is warranted for them to get involved in influencing energy and climate policies..."

"...Knowledge about what is happening may spur interest in the causes of climate change. In turn, people may want to know how well the world's people are doing, or not doing, in limiting human-made forcings that contribute to climate change..."

Dr. Hansen's Columbia University web page: http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/ and at NASA GISS: http://www.giss.nasa.gov/staff/jhansen.html

Wired on PNAS "Tipping Elements" Special: "7 Tipping Points That Could Transform Earth" (via @wired @9brandon)

Seafloor Methane: Methane plumes rising from the Arctic Ocean floor/National Oceanography Centre, Southampton.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/12/tipping-elements/all/1

Brandon Keim: (@9brandon http://www.earthlab.net/) "When the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued its last report in 2007, environmental tipping points were a footnote. A troubling footnote, to be sure, but the science was relatively new and unsettled. Straightforward global warming was enough to worry about. But when the IPCC meets in 2014, tipping points -- or tipping elements, in academic vernacular -- will get much more attention. ..."

PNAS Dec. 2009: http://www.pnas.org/content/106/49.toc

also see: 

Signs From Earth Dec. 11, 2009: PNAS Free Special on Earth's "Tipping Elements": Must Decarbonize...industrial metabolism:"

http://ddimick.typepad.com/dennis_dimicks_blog/2009/12/pnas-free-special-on-earths-tipping-elements-must-decarbonizeindustrial-metabolism-cop15.html

The National Academies of Science in the United States published Dec. 8, 2009 in its Proceedings a free online section addressing "tipping elements" in Earth's system, and the role of our carbon-intensive economy in driving earth to a new state:

From PNAS introduction: http://www.pnas.org/content/106/49/20561.full

"...If international climate policies succeed, against all odds, in sealing an ambitious deal on the confinement of global warming to <2 *C, then the focus of TE (Tipping Elements) research should actually shift to the social transformations arena: a massive acceleration of innovation processes for the decarbonization of our contemporary industrial metabolism will be the only way to deliver. In the more likely case of insufficient mitigation targets and measures, however, future TE research will rather have to predict how and when the environmental face of the Earth is going to be disfigured..."

Crossing "Planetary Boundaries": We near danger thresholds, says IGBP's new Global Change magazine

http://www.igbp.net/page.php?pid=478

IGBP Home Page: http://www.igbp.net/

Link to PDF of issue: http://www.igbp.net/documents/resources/NL74-web.pdf

Planetary Boundaries Article: http://www.igbp.net/documents/NL74-planet_edge.pdf

also see earlier: Planetary Boundaries article in Nature (via @naturenews) et al

http://ddimick.posterous.com/?sort=&search=planetary+boundaries

Also: IGBP Climate Change Index: Climate Change in a Nutshell

http://www.igbp.net/page.php?pid=504

Link to article PDF: http://www.igbp.net/documents/NL74-CC_nutshell.pdf

Related: Signs From Earth Notes: By the Numbers: A Dow Jones Index for the World's Climate from IGBP

http://ddimick.posterous.com/by-the-numbers-a-dow-jones-index-for-the-worl

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California Groundwater Disappears: Satellites Show Equivalent of Lake Mead Gone from Central Valley Aquifer

JPL: Grace observed ground water trends in the Sacramento and San Joaquin River basins, Oct. 2003 to March 2009. 

http://grace.jpl.nasa.gov/news/index.cfm?FuseAction=ShowNews&NewsID=35

JPL PR on presentation at Dec. 2009 AGU Meeting: "...Combined, California's Sacramento and San Joaquin drainage basins have shed more than 30 cubic kilometers of water since late 2003, said professor Jay Famiglietti of the University of California, Irvine. A cubic kilometer is about 264.2 billion gallons, enough to fill 400,000 Olympic-size pools. The bulk of the loss occurred in California's agricultural Central Valley. The Central Valley receives its irrigation from a combination of groundwater pumped from wells and surface water diverted from elsewhere.

"Grace data reveal groundwater in these basins is being pumped for irrigation at rates that are not sustainable if current trends continue," Famiglietti said. "This is leading to declining water tables, water shortages, decreasing crop sizes and continued land subsidence. The findings have major implications for the U.S. economy, as California's Central Valley is home to one sixth of all U.S. irrigated land, and the state leads the nation in agricultural production and exports..."

Eurekalert from UC-Irvine:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-12/uoc--ctw121409.php

"...New space observations reveal that since October 2003, the aquifers for California's primary agricultural region - the Central Valley - and its major mountain water source - the Sierra Nevada - have lost nearly enough water combined to fill Lake Mead, America's largest reservoir. The findings, based on satellite data, reflect California's extended drought and increased pumping of groundwater for human uses such as irrigation...."

JPL: In the 66-month period analyzed, the water stored in the combined Sacramento and San Joaquin Basin decreased by more than 31 cubic kilometers, or nearly the volumne of Lake Mead. Nearly two-thirds of this came from changes in groundwater storage, primarily from the Central Valley.

BBC on this: Satellites Weigh California Water

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8414252.stm

Editorial: theday.com: Declining Groundwater Endangers Food Security

http://www.theday.com/article/20091214/OP01/312149963/1069/rss06

"The nation cannot afford to ignore declining water tables in California's Central Valley that will soon threaten the food security of the United States if current trends continue unabated. NASA researchers delivered that warning at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco..."

Also See: On a GRACE study of India groundwater losses: Signs From Earth--Groundwater Disappearing in Northern India

http://ddimick.typepad.com/dennis_dimicks_blog/2009/08/groundwater-disappearing-in-northern-india.html

GRACE:

http://www.csr.utexas.edu/grace/

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Reading - "The New Population Bomb: Four Megatrends that Will Change the World" (via @ForeignAffairs_)

http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/65735/jack-a-goldstone/the-new-population-bomb

Summary:  A series of looming demographic trends will greatly affect international security in the twenty-first century. How policymakers adjust to these changes now will determine the course of global political and economic stability for years to come.

Jack Goldstone: "...twenty-first-century international security will depend less on how many people inhabit the world than on how the global population is composed and distributed: where populations are declining and where they are growing, which countries are relatively older and which are more youthful, and how demographics will influence population movements across regions...."

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Richard Alley's AGU Bjerknes Lecture: "The Biggest Control Knob: Carbon Dioxide in Earth's Climate History"

http://www.agu.org/meetings/fm09/lectures/lecture_videos/A23A.shtml

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Ross Gelbspan’s video on climate change "In Conclusion..." (via @climateprogress)

Ross Gelbspan's Website: The Heat is Online

http://www.heatisonline.org/

Climate Progress on this: "Watch Ross Gelbspan's video on climate change and the fossil-fuel-funded disinformation campaign"

http://climateprogress.org/2009/12/27/watch-ross-gelbspans-video-on-climate-change-and-the-fossil-fuel-industry-fossil-fuel-funded-disinformation-campaign-launched/

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18 Reasons to be Cheerful After Copenhagen (via @worldchanging)

http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/010913.html

KlimaForum Declaration:

http://www.klimaforum09.org/IMG/pdf/A_People_s_Declaration_from_Klimaforum09_-_ultimate_version.pdf

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When Limiting Carbon Emissions Fails: "The Geoengineering Gambit" (via @techreview etal)

Mauricio Alego

http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/24157/?nlid=2629

"For years, radical thinkers have proposed risky technologies that they say could rapidly cool the earth and offset global warming. Now a growing number of mainstream climate scientists say we may have to consider extreme action despite the dangers."

Kevin Bullis: "...Atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide have already climbed to 385 parts per million, well over the 350 parts per million that many scientists say is the upper limit for a relatively stable climate. And despite government-led efforts to limit carbon emissions in many countries, annual emissions from fossil-fuel combustion are going up, not down: over the last two decades, they have increased 41 percent. In the last 10 years, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased by nearly two parts per million every year. At this rate, they'll be twice preindustrial levels by the end of the century. 

"Meanwhile, researchers are growing convinced that the climate might be more sensitive to greenhouse gases at this level than once thought. "The likelihood that we're going to avoid serious damage seems quite low," says Schrag. "The best we're going to do is probably not going to be good enough." This shocking realization has caused many influential scientists, including Obama advisors like Schrag, to fundamentally change their thinking about how to respond to climate change. They have begun calling for the government to start funding research into geoengineering--large-scale schemes for rapidly cooling the earth..."

http://www.technologyreview.com/

Daniel Schrag: http://schraglab.unix.fas.harvard.edu/index.html

also see: April 17, 2009: Signs From Earth: Moving Geoengineering From the Shadows

Summary of a panel discussion that I helped orchestrate and organize at the 2009 Aspen Environment Forum. (http://www.aspenenvironment.org) 

Panelists included: Ken Caldeira, David Keith, and David Victor; Marty Hoffert and Robert Socolow were attendees and discussants. With links to additional articles and references on geoengineering, including Jamais Cascio's (@cascio) book "Hacking the Earth," and Alan Robock's essay "20 Reasons Why Geoengineering May Be a Bad Idea." 

http://ddimick.typepad.com/dennis_dimicks_blog/2009/04/moving-geoengineering-from-the-shadows.html

also see: Signs From Earth Notes: Geoengineering

http://ddimick.posterous.com/?sort=&search=geoengineering

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Climate Study: Plants & animals must move ≥ 1/4 mi/yr as habitats shift up and north (via @naturenews etal)

Nine Mile Run near Pittsburgh, PA. Rising temperatures and changing rainfall patterns as a result of changing climate are forcing plants and animals to migrate, or change their ranges, at projected rates of at least 1/4 mile a year. This according to a study published Dec. 23 in the journal Nature. Photo by leafy/flickr.

http://www.ciw.edu/news/climate_change_puts_ecosystems_run

PR from Carnegie Institution of Washington: "Global warming is causing climate belts to shift toward the poles and to higher elevations. To keep pace with these changes, the average ecosystem will need to shift about a quarter mile each year, says a new study led by scientists at the Carnegie Institution. For some habitats, such as low-lying areas, climate belts are moving even faster, putting many species in jeopardy, especially where human development has blocked migration paths...."

Nature: The Velocity of Climate Change

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v462/n7276/abs/nature08649.html

From Abstract: "The ranges of plants and animals are moving in response to recent changes in climate. As temperatures rise, ecosystems with 'nowhere to go', such as mountains, are considered to be more threatened. However, species survival may depend as much on keeping pace with moving climates as the climate's ultimate persistence. Here we present a new index of the velocity of temperature change (km yr-1), derived from spatial gradients (*C km-1) and multimodel ensemble forecasts of rates of temperature increase (*Cyr-1) in the twenty-first century. This index represents the instantaneous local velocity along Earth's surface needed to maintain constant temperatures, and has a global mean of 0.42kmyr-1..."

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Sea Level Rise Planning Maps: Likelihood of Shore Protection

http://plan.risingsea.net/

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As Global Temperatures Rise, So Too Do Health Risks (via @newshour)

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/health/july-dec09/globalhealth_12-24.html

From report by Ray Suarez: "...DR. MARIA NEIRA: Our message is, if climate change continues, the health of the people will be affected, particularly the health of the people -- the people living in very poor countries, but as well the health of the people living in very developed countries. Second message, to convince everybody that they need to do something about reducing carbon emissions is that is a commonsense thing..."

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Why the FAIL #COP15 meme? As if a 2-week meeting can re-engineer the world energy system re: @guardianeco

Perhaps we focus on the wrong thing, how #COP15 failed to live up to "expectations." 

Instead of a huge carbon-generating meeting to discuss limiting carbon emissions, how about one to catalyze massive investment, development, and deployment of low-carbon energy as fast as possible? 

We can't limit carbon emissions without energy supplies that are limited in their carbon emissions. 

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How do I know China wrecked the Copenhagen deal? I was in the room, Mark Lynas, The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/22/copenhagen-climate-change-mark-lynas

"If you want to know who's to blame for Copenhagen, look to the US Senate, George Monbiot, The Guardian"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/21/copenhagen-failure-us-senate-vested-interests

"We're all eco-warriors now after world leaders failed us at Copenhagen, James Garvey, guardian.co.uk"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/cif-green/2009/dec/21/copenhagen-climate-change

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See These on a Big Screen: The decade in news photographs (via @big_picture) #photojournalism #history

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/12/the_decade_in_news_photographs.html

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Evolution: Stewart Brand’s Strange Trip from Whole Earth to Nuclear Power (via @YaleE360)

http://www.e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2227

Stewart Brand: "...The air pollution from coal burning is estimated to cause 30,000 deaths a year from lung disease in the United States, and 350,000 a year in China," writes Brand. "A 1-gigawatt coal plant burns three million tons of fuel a year and produces seven million tons of CO2, all of which immediately goes into everyone's atmosphere, where no one can control it, and no one knows what it's really up to..."

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