Worse than models projected: Record low arctic sea ice already, and still another couple weeks to go

Click for the animation:


Uncertainty is not our friend. The risk can be greater than models suggest: for Arctic sea ice, the loss is happening much faster than predicted.   So relying on the model projections to inform your decisionmaking may not be enough;


Water planners, there may be a lesson here.

Bill McKibben on climate threat to localism; "we've got to work globally."

Should local-first advocates also help tackle global climate change? On Sunday night in a taped discussion, Bill McKibben told us yes -- "The only thing that can derail this [localism] revolution is how we're degrading the planet." He pointed out that the extreme weather which hit Vermont (in 2010(?)) "washed away the local farms" that had taken 20 years or more to build up. "So we've got to work globally, which is what 350.org is for."

Thoughts of 4th of July parade spectators on global warming and solutions.

A little after noon, before Nevada City's (2pm) 4th of July parade, I started up Broad Street with voice recorder in hand,  asking the earlybird spectators what came to mind when they heard the term "global warming", and then if they indicated it was a problem, what came to mind for solutions.

Jeff Masters: next week may be our turn

"Around July 11, a sharp ridge of high pressure is expected to build in over the Western U.S., bringing the potential for crazy-hot conditions capable of toppling all-time heat records in many western states. "

- from Weather Underground co-founder Jeff Masters, in his post The June 2012 U.S. heat wave: one of the greatest in recorded history.  He continues,

"The intense heat and lack of rain, combined with soils that dried out early in the year due to lack of snowfall, have led to widespread areas of moderate to extreme drought over much of the nation's grain growing regions, from Kansas to Indiana. The USDA is reporting steadily deteriorating crop conditions for corn and soybeans, and it is likely that a multi-billion dollar drought disaster is underway in the Midwest."

See also Sierra Voices: this is what global warming looks like.

Kevin Trenberth: We're looking at the future (of global warming)

Trenberth on PBS, talking about the wild weather & record heat as a taste of the future under global warming.

Which U.S. congressional candidates support ending the $12b/yr taxpayer subsidies to fossil fuel industry?

Positions of our district's House and Senate candidates and incumbents (and their opponents), in response to queries by email and web form:  (last edited 2012-05-25 pm)

Contact info for Aanestad, Arrowsmith or Dacquisto?

Update: Never mind, this post is moot.  (Three cheers for the League of Women Voters, for their smartvoter.org website.)

I've emailed or otherwise contacted all the other U.S. congressional candidates on our Nevada County ballots, asking whether they'd support the Sanders/Ellison "End Polluter Welfare Act" bill to stop the roughly $12 billion/year in taxpayer-funded subsidies to fossil fuel companies.

But I am not finding the email or other contact info for Aanestad, Arrowsmith and Dacquisto.

This a.m, planning for May 5 Climate Impacts Day, on climate change & extreme weather - connect the dots

We were hugely fortunate to have Bill McKibben come here last week (Tue 17th) and speak to a packed house about global warming, and about the "global weirding" of weather that we've seen over the last several years. (If you haven't seen the talk, an edited-down version will air on NCTV, on the Occupy Nevada County program.) His most trenchant statement was essentially this:

Working to green your local community is important; just don't make the mistake of ONLY working on those things - because this won't be nearly enough to tackle the scale of the problem.

He also spoke a lot about "global weirding", the spate of wild weather that's hit our world over the last few years - record U.S. heat in March, "the French heat wave, the Chicago heat wave, the Australia heat wave, the Russian heat wave, the Texas drought"; the Pakistan and Phillipine floods...

A quick summary of 2011 [New England] weather highlights would read approximately like this:  Devastating snowstorm, devastating snowstorm, blizzard, heat wave, heat wave, torrential rains, hurricane (more torrential rains), floods, hurricane remnants (even more torrential rains), worse floods, even more devastating snowstorm—and that only takes you through October.  (link)

 The climate group that McKibben and seven Middlebury College students started, 350.org, is holding a worldwide action May 5 to stand in solidarity with communities and workers (including Vermont small farmers) impacted by this wild weather - and we in Nevada County will participate.  Our planning meeting is at 8:30 a.m. this (Sat.) morning at Sierra Mountain Coffee Roasters; and the event itself will be next Saturday afternoon, 3pm.  Stay tuned...

Why it matters

We can tangle on details of the science, but it's more important to step back and consider the risks.

See this excerpt from Elisabeth Kolbert's interview with Bill McKibben. Is it worth an extra 2 or 3% of income, to make a high-risk gamble with the only home we've got, when it's irreplaceable?

Keep in mind that uncertainty actually makes the risk picture worse.

McKibben will speak here in Nevada City next Tuesday eve (tickets at Briarpatch), and a climate speaker from the Carnegie Institution at Stanford will speak at the May 18 Sierra Club meeting.


p.s. for newbies: SkepticalScience.com is the best resource I know of for checking out the science bearing on contrarian climate claims.

Hottest March, hottest 12 months on record for contiguous U.S.; with inaction, expect much more.

March temperatures were "as much as 15 degrees F hotter than average" (link);  35 times more heat records were set than cold records.  For the contiguous U.S., aka the "lower 48", this was the warmest March and the hottest January-March on record, according to the NOAA's National Climate Data Center State of the Climate Report; and the hottest 12 months on record, according to Weather Underground meteorologist Jeff Masters. (link)

"This is weird. This is not good." (link)

And it's with just 1.5 degrees F average warming over the past century; this century, if we don't change course, we expect five times more. (link)

(But this doesn't give us license to throw up our hands and walk away; "Pick any guideline you want, from 1C to 2C to who knows what, and in whatever “important” time frame you prefer, but the inescapable bottom line is that there is always a very high human cost to doing too little. And the further we are from doing enough, ... we’re undeniably making the situation, and thereby the price humanity will pay, much worse by our inaction..." (link) )

Uncertainty; (4/1) Climate science fixed, "wrong sign paradox" finally resolved. And other news.

RealClimate has the good news; though you might want to check the publication date.  (Also, is April Fools Day a worldwide observance, or is it just for Euro&North American culture?)

Also, from the NY Times on March 28, see Justin Gillis's Weather Runs Hot and Cold, So Scientists Look to the Ice - meaning the decline of Arctic sea ice, a disruption that'll likely disrupt weather patterns.

Climate models, which didn't predict this much weather weirdness, "have always had a kind of stodginess to them" (link); so when someone says that "climate models are uncertain," remember (since they typically don't mention this fact) that uncertainty cuts both ways, and increases the threat considerably:

"As uncertainty increases, the probability of a truly catastrophic outcome [goes up disproportionately: an increase in]...the standard deviation of our distribution...from .5 to 2.5 increases the likelihood of catastrophe by a factor of 200."

Edited (wording, add link) 2012-04-10,11.

Citizens Climate Lobby

This group looks good: Citizens Climate Lobby, "Political will for a livable world."  And I do like their "Ask Me How to Make $1,500 and Get Clean Air" tagline, which needs to be a bumper sticker.

"The fundamental problem of climate policy is on the political leadership and corporate power side", Rick Piltz of Climate Science Watch points out; so it's more effective to focus energy there, both on the "political will for climate action" part, and on the "reform politics to make it work better" part.

(Or at least that's my perspective du jour; stay tuned.)


(The other consideration is, what if you speak like Paul Graham but don't write like Paul Graham?  How do you weigh your strengths and preferences against the biggest needs in the "move America forward" ecosystem?)

Some very short climate-related animations

Here's a compilation of short animations on climate science and climate change:

• Richard Alley's Milankovich dance, explaining the ice ages, CO2 and global warming (5 min.)
• 130 years of historical global temperature change (1880-2011, NASA); 26 seconds 
• Arctic sea ice retreat, 1980-2007, about 30 seconds 
• “Time history of atmospheric CO2?;  shows the earth “breathing” over 800 thousand years; about 3 minutes 
• Trend and Variation; “Human walking an active dog on leash” metaphor for signal vs. noise in climate change (“We’re looking at the dog, but we should be concentrating on the owner…”); about 1 minute
• It’s All About Carbon; a series of roughly 3-minute cartoon shorts from PBS, explaining greenhouse gas science.  (But as I recall, the "personal action" ending could have used refurbishing: it needs the POW pledge.)

About the Heartland climate denial documents leak

2012-02-22 update:  Ouch.
Documents from the Heartland Institute regarding their climate confusion efforts have been leaked to climate bloggers (blogs like DeSmogBlog and Deep Climate have been on the case ), coinciding with the release of John Mashey's 50200+pp report Fake science, fakexperts, funny finances, free of tax, which makes the case that these "501(c)(3) nonprofits" sure look a lot like lobbying outfits.

Climate activist Bill McKibben to speak in Nevada City, mid-April

Climate action heavyweight Bill McKibben of 350.org will be speaking here in Nevada County - venue and date being Miner's Foundry and April 17, I'm pretty sure.

Kudos to those who had the vision to invite him.

Also - if you haven't already watched this - here's a ~30 second NASA animation of earth's recorded temperatures from 1884-2011 (human actions are driving it,  not the sun) ...
Also, projected future increases (at link, scroll down; note & consider the divergent red & blue paths) show the need for meaningful action ASAP.


(edited (wording) 2012-02-13)

Wild & Scenic Film Fest report – Death of a Forest

For wreaking death & devastation on North America's high-elevation forests, climate change has been wielding a handy tool - the inconspicuous bark beetle.

The climate change impact of methane from permafrost etc

So, a friend reports hearing news that Arctic methane releases are way worse than CO2.  How do you respond, or check out this claim?

Walking the dog, illuminating climate change

This video shows a great metaphor for separating short-term variation from long-term trend:

Pentagon and neocon - global climate disruption is a threat multiplier

Your climate-doubting uncle needs to know that the Pentagon, the insurance companies, and this forward-thinking neocon with "impeccable conservative credentials" see the threats posed by climate change and the need for action:

Aldo Leopold, visionary - we need him now

Did you see Green Fire?
We need Aldo Leopold a hell of a lot more now, than we did when he was alive.