MetaFilter posts tagged with GlobalWarming

The Economist: The World in 2010

goodnewsfortheinsane — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 17:09:43 -0800

In 2010, Obama will have a miserable year, NATO may lose in Afghanistan, the UK gets a regime change, China needs to chill, India's factories will overtake its farms, Europe risks becoming an irrelevant museum, the stimulus will need an exit strategy, the G20 will see a challenge from the "G2", African football will unite Korea, conflict over natural resources will grow, Sarkozy will be unloved and unrivalled, the kids will come together to solve the world's problems (because their elders are unable), technology will grow ever more ubiquitous, we'll all charge our phones via USB, MBAs will be uncool, the Space Shuttle will be put to rest, and Somalia will be the worst country in the world. And so the Tens begin.

The Economist: The World in 2010. Previously: 2009, 2008, 2007. How did we do last time around? Guest contributions: President of the European Commission José Manuel Barroso lines up Europe's priorities President of Russia Dmitry Medvedev argues for dialogue and cooperation President of the Maldives Mohamed Nasheed wants his island nation to remain above water President of Indonesia Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono would like for Islam and the West to live in harmony President of South Africa Jacob Zuma says Africa should rise to the occasion Director-General of the World Health Organisation Margaret Chan predicts the development of the flu pandemic Managing director of the International Monetary Fund Dominique Strauss-Kahn explains how to prevent another crisis CEO of Yahoo! Carol Bartz believes business leaders should tap into the information flood Chairman of HSBC Stephen Green argues that the financial sector should welcome emerging economies CEO of Fiat Group and Chrysler Group Sergio Marchionne thinks greener cars require bolder action CEO/CTO of SpaceX Elon Musk says the private sector should handle space travel

Environmental Discrimination?

mccarty.tim — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 07:29:01 -0800

Tim Nicholson, a UK former executive, believes he was fired for his environmental views. He has sued his former employer for discrimination on grounds of the Employment Equality act, which states that employees may not be discriminated against for religious or philosophical beliefs. His former employers argue that his views were political, and thus do not fall under the act. This would not be the first time religion and global warming were compared, but usually the comparison is unfavorable and used to either discredit the science or to imply religious people cannot be environmentalists, as that leads to distracting from their faith for worldly or heretical concerns. This raises a lot of interesting questions about discrimination in the workplace, and what should be considered a religion or philosophical view.

Superfreakonomics: It's getting hot in here.

afu — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 20:22:58 -0800

The Freakonomics follow up, Superfreakonomics, contains a chapter on climate change that lives up to the best selling contrarian style of authors Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner. However actual climate scientists were not pleased with the chapter. According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, the book "repeats tired global cooling myths," "unfairly trashes climate models" and "advocates rolling the dice on unproven technology" among other faults. They have also been accused of misquoting climate scientist Ken Caldeira. Levitt and Dubner respond to their critics, Global Warming in SuperFreakonomics: The Anatomy of a Smear. Full critique from climate progress 1 2 3 4 5

350 ppm is all we've got

wilful — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 20:35:06 -0800

350 ppm A new campaign by leading environmental organisations focuses on the simple message of 350, being the parts per million CO2 equivalent that recent science is telling us is the planet's long-term budget to avoid catastrophic human-induced climate change. They're calling for a day of action on 24 October, prior to 'COP 15', the Copenhagen climate change conference from 7 to 18 December this year.

Pizzly? Grolar Bear? Polargrizz? Polzly? Nanulak?

fourcheesemac — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 17:04:18 -0800

The Polar Bear/Grizzly Hybrid: The Ursid Hybrid cross has been attested since a hunter (with a Polar Bear license, and yes, they can be had) shot one in 2006 on Banks Island in Canada's Northwest Territories. Climate change may also play a role, causing an increasing overlap in range and mating season. Polar Bears do show a surprising resilience despite the overwhelming , increasing threats to their survival. Hunting policy itself may play a role, reducing the number of males and driving the females to mate out of season and range. The Native Inuit hunters who are permitted to hunt Polar Bears for subsistence (enabling the sport hunt, which may or may not benefit the Native economy, leading many Natives to support sport hunting) have come into sharp conflict with outside environmentalists. Welcome to the new Far North.

3D Mapping

netbros — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 17:44:55 -0800

Durango Bill's Home Page. With topics that include: 3D end-to-end tour of the Grand Canyon, the origin and formation of the Colorado River, and examples of river systems that cut through mountain ranges instead of taking easier routes around them in Ancestral Rivers of the World. But if geology and 3D mapping isn't your thing, Bill also entertains and informs with his evaluations of creationism and religious cultists, an energy/oil analysis, gaming probability analysis, graph and number theories and applied mathematics. Durango Bill is a busy dude.

Break on through to the greener side

littlerobothead — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 06:44:50 -0800

Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus want to change the way countries think about global warming. Instead of treating carbon as a pollutant, and legislating our way out of a climate crisis, they suggest a "challenge" approach to the problem—igniting a creative fire under companies and even the federal government to create new and cheaper solutions instead of more loophole-filled legislation.

"When was the last time human beings modernized our energy sources by making older power sources more expensive?" he asks the interns. "And, of course, by now you probably know that the answer is never."

And, they have a posse:

"The president has adopted their language, their message, the story they helped to develop," Teague says. "The next stage in the development of all of this is for the actual reality of the policy to reflect the glowing, wonderful, positive, visionary rhetoric."

What remains to be seen is if the federal government has the stomach (or the budget) for the massive research endeavor their approach would require. The example engineering and research program advanced as a model by Shellenberger and Nordhaus is the US moon landing, with a 1969 price tag of over $25 billion. In today's dollars, that's a lot of bailouts.

Luke Cole has died.

granted — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 12:21:59 -0800

Luke Cole, founder of environmental justice organization Center for Race, Poverty, and the Environment (scroll down for bio), has died in a car accident in Uganda. A lawyer, he was representing the village of Kivalina, Alaska, in a lawsuit against 24 oil companies who are alleged to have contributed to global warming. Dozens of people have written tributes to Cole on his Facebook profile. Cole's wife survived the crash. More on the Kivalina lawsuit (pdf file): "In this lawsuit, the villagers allege that global warming has caused the melting of Arctic sea ice which formerly protected the village from winter storms, and that the increased pace of the melting ice has caused erosion and contends that, 'if the entire village is not relocated soon, the village will be destroyed.'"

Waste heat: the other global warming

stbalbach — Fri, 29 May 2009 06:51:11 -0800

The Other Global Warming. Waste heat (second law of thermodynamics) over the next 300 years could add 3 degrees of warming.

Climate projection roulette wheel

stbalbach — Wed, 20 May 2009 10:35:42 -0800

MIT has completed the most comprehensive computer climate model to date to project how much warming will occur in the 21st century. The biggest unknown is not nature, but human actions to address the problem. To illustrate the results of 400 simulations they use a roulette wheel display - which wheel is spun and where the ball stops no one knows. The simulation uses the MIT Integrated Global Systems Model.

Geoengineering

homunculus — Sat, 02 May 2009 11:27:27 -0800

Geoengineering and the New Climate Denialism. "[S]ometimes the politics around an issue become so twisted that it's necessary to address the politics before we can have a real discussion about the problems and how to solve them. That's the case with geoengineering."

Solar Towers are a magnificent alternative to solar cells.

brenton — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 16:39:58 -0800

A solar updraft tower generates electricity with nothing more than a greenhouse and a tall chimney. A 195 meter tall prototype in Spain cheaply operated at 50 kW for years. Now there are plans to build others, including a 40 MW tower, 750 meters tall (near twice as tall as the current tallest structure in the EU). Two others, a 200 MW tower in Australia (previously discussed) or a 400 MW tower in Namibia could become the tallest structure of any kind if built: 1km and 1.5km tall, respectively. Yet even those are dwarfed by the theoretical super chimney which could stand 5km tall and 1km wide. Such a tower would use the Earth's atmosphere itself as the greenhouse, could cause rain, reduce global warming and generate over 300,000 MW of "green" electricity. EnviroMission has a fantastic video demonstration of their Solar Tower.

Is the Science Settled Enough for Policy?

nola — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 16:02:51 -0800

A great lecture on global warming given by Professor Stephen Schneider at Stanford University Professor Schneider discusses the pitfalls of presenting scientific ideas on global warming to the public.

Keepin' real with geothermal engineering

Brian B. — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 19:04:59 -0800

Global warming quick fixes roundup, featuring the new water spray cooling method. There's also biochar carbon sequestration for the soil, or perhaps growing reflective crops, or growing crops with seawater in barren deserts. For the oceans, we have iron fed green algae management, and crop waste dumping too. In the skies, there's sunshading to reflect the problem rays, or perhaps a volcano simulation by filling the atmosphere with sulphur. Finally, there's an idea for a three-mile high superchimney that does it all.

What do you say to THAT, Mr. Gore?

flatluigi — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 06:54:25 -0800

If Global Warming Is Real, Then Why Is It Cold?

Arctic icemelt unambiguous evidence

stbalbach — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 10:57:42 -0800

Arctic Melt update: Scientists now have unambiguous evidence that the theorized phenomenon known as "polar amplification" has in fact been occurring for the past 5 years. It was not expected to be seen for at least another 10 or 15 years. "We're in a vicious positive feedback loop." Has the Arctic melt passed the point of no return?

Although researchers have documented a catastrophic loss of sea ice during the summer months over the past 20 years, they have not until now detected the definitive temperature signal that they could link with greenhouse-gas emissions. However, scientists [now] show that Arctic amplification has been under way for the past five years, and it will continue to intensify Arctic warming for the foreseeable future. Computer models of the global climate have for years suggested the Arctic will warm at a faster rate than the rest of the world due to Arctic amplification but many scientists believed this effect would only become measurable in the coming decades. However, a study by scientists from the US National Snow and Ice Data Centre (NSIDC) in Colorado has found that amplification is already showing up as a marked increase in surface air temperatures within the Arctic region during the autumn period, when the sea ice begins to reform after the summer melting period.

We're not doomed, but we are in danger.

stinkycheese — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 09:20:39 -0800

Gwynne Dyer's new book Climate Wars discusses the conflicts likely to result in the near future from our changing climate. The first chapter ("The Geopolitics of Climate Change") is available here. He is now on a lecture tour [various lecture notes] and speaks on the subject [MP3 of radio interview] next Monday in Toronto. Previous MeFi posts on Gwynne Dyer. Bonus: rare picture of Dyer sans leather jacket!

The Northwest Passage

Glibpaxman — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 21:14:23 -0800

Scientists are now revising earlier projections about the speed at which global warming will impact the arctic ice sheet. By 2013 it could very well disappear in the summer months, opening up new sea lanes for commerce and, potentially, "a quarter of the earths oil and natural gas resources". Several arctic countries are thinking ahead, while it appears others have been for quite some time.

Climate Futures

homunculus — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 12:12:33 -0800

New Year’s Day 2030. A new report from Forum on the Future, Climate Futures (6.7MB PDF), maps out five possible scenarios for how climate change might affect our collective future by 2030. Meanwhile, the WWF has released a report, Climate Change: Faster, Stronger, Sooner (1.65MB PDF) which claims that global warming is accelerating at a faster rate than climate change experts had previously predicted. [Via Gristmill and Disinformation]

Put the gun down, and step away

5MeoCMP — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 21:15:15 -0800

The clathrate gun hypothesis has been discussed previously, but now might be a good time to start considering it less hypothetical. [via] It's also a great band name, though Single Gun Theory kind of got there first.

"Total Warming"

iamkimiam — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:44:37 -0800

Global Warming. The video was made by McCann Erickson (ad agency) for the Portuguese Association, Quercus.

ForestFilter

homunculus — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 18:00:10 -0800

Old Growth Forests Are Valuable Carbon Sinks. "Contrary to 40 years of conventional wisdom, a new analysis published in the journal Nature suggests that old growth forests are usually 'carbon sinks' - they continue to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and mitigate climate change for centuries." Seven Best National Parks for Visiting Old Growth Forests. 20 Visually Arresting but Threatened Forests. The Truth About Tongass: Alaska's Tongass National Forest includes the greatest tracts of rain forest outside the tropics. Subsidized logging is ripping them apart. "I speak for the trees!"

Santa set adrift

Knappster — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 22:18:30 -0800

For the first time in at least 125,000 years, the Arctic ice cap is an island. (prev iously)

The 4th degree

Artw — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 17:38:04 -0800

80 percent of Americans say global warming is real and poses a threat to humanity. Which is good because if the global temperature raises by 4 degrees we're all dead. However only 44 percent would be willing to face any financial hardship in the name of a solution.

There Could Be Blood

kliuless — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 18:36:53 -0800

Andy Grove on Our Electric Future - "Energy independence [viz.] is the wrong goal. Here is a plan Americans can stick to." Perhaps some infrastructure spending^1,2 is in order? [etc., &c., cf.] also see :P - "Tesla Motors Is Delivering Cars" - "Superconducting Power Grid Launches In New York" - "New heights reached in polymer based solar cell efficiency"

[S]pray a sheet of glass with a mixture of dyes combined with a substance called tris(8-hydroxyquinoline) aluminium. In combination, the dyes and the glass act as the waveguide, preventing light from escaping. Meanwhile, the interaction between the different dye molecules and those of the tris(8-hydroxyquinoline) aluminium allows a quantum-mechanical phenomenon, called Förster energy transfer, to come into play. This eliminates the reabsorption loss by ensuring that light is re-emitted at a frequency which the dye molecules cannot then reabsorb. On top of this—literally—Dr Currie and Dr Mapel have come up with another trick: placing a second sandwich of dye and glass over the first. The upper layer of dye intercepts high-energy light, such as ultraviolet. The lower one captures longer wavelengths that have passed unperturbed through the upper, and also any lower-energy light that has been re-emitted within the top layer and somehow escaped. The upshot is a device that, even as a prototype, converts ten times more of the incident light into electricity than a conventional solar cell. [and btw]

cheers!