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Post by Mech on Dec 15, 2006 20:54:46 GMT -5
WHAT happened to MMMMMBarium? ? I hope no one kicked him out...otherwise...you may as well kick me out..if no dissenting voices are allowed here.
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Post by Swamp Gas on Dec 15, 2006 21:28:45 GMT -5
mmmbarium was banned because of cursing at me and members, being a troll, and a disinformation purveyor.
Why would you be banned because of an opinion? Most here just happen to disagree with you on this subject. Most of what you post, everyone sees your point, and totally respects you.
Glonalists also want a corporate/War controlled world, and fossil fuel is the engine that drives the war machine.
What these "Experts" (Exxon/Mobil/Lockheed/GE/Limbaugh) always state, is to disintegrate EVERY idea of progressive thought, especially the push for alternative forms of energy, which the aforementioned group have no stake in.
Alternative energy requires a futuristic mind, of which that same group cannot comprehend.
Global Warming is real. Ozone Depletion is Real. Fossil fuel burning is accelerating both of these.
Solar Flares and Galactic Wind are just other factors in the equation.
An Ice Age will happen much faster if Human Accelerated Global Warming is not slowed down.
Aerosol Mitigation is a band-aid to hold off Ozone depletion and Global Warming, so the "Dinosaurs" and Cro-Magnons in the Fossil/War economy can continue raping the earth
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Post by altitudelou on Dec 15, 2006 23:27:34 GMT -5
Mech wrote,
"Something "environmentalists" always want to discount and deny....so they can continue their blame on BAD HUMANS...."killem off...kill em off....they are BAD!!!"..when it comes to global warming...which is happening on ALL PLANETS IN OUR SOLAR SYSTEM." ____________________________________________________________________________________________
Mech,
I don't see to many environmentalists abdicating worldwide population reduction, that's been brought forward by the likes of Ed Teller / super scientist and his fanatic followers.
What does it matter if the sun is causing global warming on all of the planets of our solar system, it's now a proven fact that we humans have f#cking this one up since the 1800's, and besides, how many of our solar system planets are inhabited by humans anyway, only one as far as I know, so we better take care of it, A-What ?
You can piss in your well too, but would you, so why are we doing it to our planet ?
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Post by Mech on Dec 15, 2006 23:32:11 GMT -5
UMMMMM NO.
JPL (jet propulsion laboratory) and NASA are saying this.
The sun cycles are a HUGE factor.
..and it is expected to INCREASE over this century.
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Post by Mech on Dec 15, 2006 23:50:32 GMT -5
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Post by Swamp Gas on Dec 16, 2006 1:54:20 GMT -5
Dick Cheney, Adolf Hitler, Richard Nixon, John D Rockefeller, Henry Ford.....Example of Fascist industrialists.
This is a silly argument.
Globalists come in every form..Indistrialists, Environmentalists, Let, Right , Libertarians, Socialists, you name it.
Then Dennis Kucinich would be a Globalist because he is an environmentalist by this equation.
here is the facts:
Global Warming is occuring..Fact
Ozone Layer is blown out...Fact
Aerosol Mitigation is attempting to offset effects of Global Warming and Ozone depletion...opinion
Solar Flares are causing Global Warming..Opinion
Fossil Fuel is causing Global Warming--Opinion
Ice Age comes after global Warming......opinion
Solar Flares are accelerating Global Warming...opinion
fossil Fuels are accelerating Global Warming...opinion
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Post by Swamp Gas on Dec 16, 2006 2:00:21 GMT -5
UMMMMM NO. JPL (jet propulsion laboratory) and NASA are saying this. The sun cycles are a HUGE factor. ..and it is expected to INCREASE over this century. JPL and NASA are both government controlled and contracted, much like the "facts" that come out about DHEA, Vitamins, and cures for cancer, from the FDA. They will slant information and give half-truths to help out corporate interests, in these cases oil companies and pharmaceuticals. Sun cycles have been occuring every 11 years, and NEVER in recorded history have caused such an increase in temperatures, since fossil use has been at an incredible rate since the 1800s. Perhaps 100,000 years ago, there was an increase in carbon dixiode levels, and this accelerated the Ice Age.
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Post by socrates on Dec 16, 2006 2:02:48 GMT -5
"Aerosol Mitigation is attempting to offset effects of Global Warming and Ozone depletion...opinion"
Swampgas, I think I found something. I linked to it on the main thread. Check out what I posted. Also Google mocage. These clowns are all bidding to produce the cocktails. But these documents are admitting to the forcing, to the manufacturing of fake cirrus. These people are nuts trying to geoengineer or play God, whatever this crap is.
It's ozone remediation for the most part imho. While this is opinion, it is backed by observation and now these new links I stumbled across.
But I know what you and Arcadia are talking about, how you have to pay to get a lot of the documents.
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Post by Swamp Gas on Dec 16, 2006 2:31:38 GMT -5
Yes, Soc, the issue of Global Warming existing it a moot point. It exists, and now all of these companies are vying for the contracts to continue spraying. The past 10 years or so have been the tests to see whether it works or not. The spraying that bigjoe says were happening 50 or 60 years ago were the very first tests of this technology, much as like I said, the first tests for Digital Recoding were done 30 years before the Compact Disc.
The Ozone issue has more disastrous effects than even Global Warming, disrupting algae and growing cycles, not to mention the 50% increase in melanoma since the 1950s.
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Post by BigBunny on Dec 16, 2006 23:03:18 GMT -5
Mech is correct in saying that the global warming phenomenon is affecting the entire Solar system. Mech is also quite correct in saying that the Sun cycles play a significant role in this planet's Gaiasphere.
However, with no disrespect intended to Mech, the problem is that on this particular rock in the Solar system, there is an overlay of pollutants that is exacerbating the natural cycle. The solution is simple and obvious - reduce the pollutants to reduce the additional global warming. What amazes me is that the vested interests haven't worked out that a green future is far more profitable than a oil soaked future. BTW we passed tipping point last year - and you know what that means.
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Post by altitudelou on Dec 16, 2006 23:26:22 GMT -5
I sure hope that 'Chicky' is ok up there in the PNW, that storm that they just got was something else, been watching the news coming out of there and it sure looks like they got hit hard, hurricane force winds, flooding, it doesn't look very nice there right now.
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Post by marklookingup on Dec 17, 2006 3:20:36 GMT -5
Lou,
Chicky is probably still without power. She lives about 50 miles due west of me. It was one of the scariest nights of my life.
What really pissed me off was the spraying going on just before the storm hit, and immediately after. God only knows what the assholes were doing during the storm itself. I could hear military aircraft all through the storm.
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Post by altitudelou on Dec 17, 2006 15:20:30 GMT -5
Mark,
Good to know that your alright as well, that was some storm that rolled in on you guys, there not calling it a hurricane but from some of the reports and pictures coming out of Washington and Oregon it sure looks like the aftermath of a hurricane.
Glad to hear you and yours are ok, best to Chicky if you hear anything,........ take care buddy.
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Post by Swamp Gas on Dec 17, 2006 15:39:46 GMT -5
Mech is correct in saying that the global warming phenomenon is affecting the entire Solar system. Mech is also quite correct in saying that the Sun cycles play a significant role in this planet's Gaiasphere. However, with no disrespect intended to Mech, the problem is that on this particular rock in the Solar system, there is an overlay of pollutants that is exacerbating the natural cycle. The solution is simple and obvious - reduce the pollutants to reduce the additional global warming. What amazes me is that the vested interests haven't worked out that a green future is far more profitable than a oil soaked future. BTW we passed tipping point last year - and you know what that means. This is exactly what I have been saying Bunny. The earth has gone through natural cycles of increased Sunspot activities, carbon dioxide increases, comets, asteroids, Ice Ages, and species destruction. Since humans have been on the planet surface, we have never been capable of accelerating this cycle beyond repair before the 1800s. Atomic blasts in the 1950s probably blew out the ozone layer more than deodorant, and fossil burning is increasing in India and China. So simple.....Hydrogen Fuel Cells, Electric, Wind, and Solar....
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Post by altitudelou on Dec 17, 2006 17:52:09 GMT -5
"So simple.....Hydrogen Fuel Cells, Electric, Wind, and Solar...." __________________________________________
So simple that the present monopolies of energy dominating the energy supply of the entire planet will spend billions to keep "Simple" from becoming a reality.
Much the same way as they are pumping millions into denying Global Warming exist, it's a done deal, Global Warming is here, right now and yet they still pay their hired scientoids to pu-pu it so they can keep on controlling the flow of the worlds big three energies, oil, gas and coal and keep the "Greenies" down on the farm.
The thing is, everyone on the planet ( Even the energy barons ) knows that we are going to have to get away from the big three energy fossil fuels and move towards the green energies if we are to survive on this planet, more pollution is not the answer, it is an excuse for the super rich to get even richer at the expense of killing our planet and us right along with it.
These greed fanatics think that they can slap a band-aid on nature ( As with this spraying program ) and everything will be just fine / business as usual, pump the oil and gas, rip more coal out of the ground because the consumers demand it, bullshit, because they demand it is more like it, the consumers know better than to buy into that transparent propaganda and that green is the way to go but it may take an energy war to break the strangle hold of the monopolies that are presently in control of the policies and politicians that protect them.
These bastards are going to do everything that they can to keep green energy from going national / international within the high consumption nations, there mantra now is that green energy is not sustainable at present and they are correct but they also want it to stay that way, small, independent producers are no threat to their empire but a thousand independent producers that unite are what they fear the most, it is those independent producers uniting that will be the wooden stake driven through the heart of the great energy vampires.
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Post by Swamp Gas on Dec 17, 2006 19:54:56 GMT -5
It is not only greed that drives the Exxon/Mobil/Lockheeds/Limbaughs, but the war machine also.
Green energy will not power the Nuclear Reactors on aircraft carriers and submarines, diesel tanks, and Fighter jets.
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Post by altitudelou on Dec 18, 2006 0:47:20 GMT -5
Dito !
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Post by altitudelou on Dec 19, 2006 23:19:05 GMT -5
From Susan Meeker-Lowry's column in
the Conway Daily Sun.
Dreaming of Snow Susan Meeker-Lowry
12/19/2006
—You’ll have to forgive me if I sound a bit cranky, but if I hear one more person remark on how great this weird, warm December weather is, I think I’ll scream. I would think that people who live here, presumably by choice, in a climate with historically cold, snowy winters that start sometimes in November but definitely by December, would want snow and a certain amount of cold, especially this time of year. But apparently not. My guess is that at least 75 percent or more of the folks who have commented to me on the weather in stores or where I work actually like the spring-like conditions we’ve been having. And when I remark that I’d prefer it a bit colder, they often look at me as if I’d just dropped in from Mars. Then I usually take the opportunity to remind them that cold and snow this time of year is what the plants, animals and insects need to survive; or, as in the case of some insects, to die back to more reasonable numbers. This is generally met with a shrug and a grudging acknowledgment that, yes, that’s right. But I can tell they aren’t really convinced, and lower heating bills and no shoveling or plowing are more immediate and welcome perks than concern for the non-humans who share the valley with us. Plus, ski areas don’t really need the real thing anymore what with whole-mountain snowmaking. Of course it’s difficult to go cross-country skiing or snowshoeing with no snow, but they don’t bring in nearly as much money as downhill, so what’s the big deal? I can’t imagine conditions are that great with daytime temps in the mid-40s and low-50s, but then, what do I know? I’ve never skied on manmade snow, having given up downhill years ago when my kids were little and we just didn’t have the money for the sport. (And could someone explain to me what exactly “wet powder conditions” are? Seems like an oxymoron to me.) There’s still time for snow to arrive before Christmas, but as I type this, there’s none in sight, even though it will get colder next week. To me, it’s very sad. Kids should have lots of snow to play in during Christmas break. Growing up here, I can recall only one brown Christmas. My parents were sweating it out, since we owned a ski lodge and it was in the dark ages before snowmaking. I do remember my father fretting over the annual January thaw that also usually came, but I don’t remember it ever totally ruining the skiing, although some years there was plenty of what we called boilerplate (would this be called frozen wet powder today?). Even so, most winters had their share of snow that didn’t turn to rain, putting real powder on the slopes. There was nothing quite like making the first tracks on a trail covered in a few inches of fresh powder. And the snow we got! Feet of it so deep, when the plow came, the snow banks were high enough that my friends and I often made snow caves that we could actually stand up in. I remember digging in those banks, made hard by the bulldozer (because we had such a big driveway), carving out seats and beds and tables, bringing my dolls and tea set in to play, pouring water over the roof so it would freeze solid and last until the next storm came and the plow filled the cave. Sometimes we dug so deep, all we had to do is clear out the door; other times, the cave was destroyed and we’d start all over again. People often say memories aren’t accurate when it comes to how much snow we got, or how high the snowbanks were, but I have the pictures to prove it, as I’m sure many longtime residents also do. I’ve noticed lately what seems to be an attempt to rewrite history. For instance there’s a radio ad for snow blowers that says something like, “We just had a typical New England storm. Three inches of snow followed by all that rain.” Well, that wasn’t typical in my childhood. It happened, yes. But it wasn’t the norm. At least not until it got closer to spring. And did you know that seed companies are in the process of changing hardiness zones to reflect the warmer winters? I hear we may soon be officially zone five. We used to be between three and four depending on exactly where you lived. Certainly it hardly ever gets much below zero anymore, forget about 30 below. Of course, we could still have a “real” winter. There’s still January and February before spring comes (which arrives weeks earlier than it used to before it devolves into more weeks of gray dampness and downpours—at least that’s what the past couple of years have been like). Maybe it’s time for ski areas, especially cross-country, to begin promoting skis on wheels to prepare us for the time, probably in the not-too-distant future, when any kind of snow, natural or otherwise, is a rare thing. I wanted to write a nice holiday piece, since this is my last column before the New Year. It would have given me the opportunity to put my own advice of being more positive into practice—which, I admit, I’m having a hard time with. I’ll try to find something less negative for my next column. Meanwhile, I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas, with lots of love and laughs, good food, and the comfort of family and friends.
Susan Meeker-Lowry is a writer who lives in Fryeburg, Maine. _______________________________________________________
I guess I'm not the only one that thinks this very strange mild winter weather here in the north east is highly unusual for December 19th.
Our pond is still not frozen over and usually there are people ice fishing on it by now using their ATV's and snow machines, yes sir, this is a weard winter for sure.
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Post by altitudelou on Dec 19, 2006 23:28:05 GMT -5
Here is more on the strange mild north east winter weather. ______________________________________________
Dec 19, 4:08 PM EST
Temperatures slide lower, but Northeast snow mostly machine made
By MICHAEL VIRTANEN Associated Press Writer LAKE PLACID, N.Y. (AP) -- With temperatures sliding lower in the Northeast, many alpine ski areas are back making snow this week, preparing for the essential free-spending holidays from Christmas through New Year's.
For snowmobilers, cross-country skiers and the businesses that serve them, however, there are only flurries in the short-term forecast and people are still whacking golf balls on a few dry fairways.
While the solstice, the Northern Hemisphere's shortest day, comes Friday, the Northeast hasn't been chilling under your grandfather's cold weather pattern, a phenomenon scientists predict will hold through winter.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration projects a December, January and February about 2 percent warmer than the 30-year average, citing both the oscillation of the ocean-atmosphere system in the tropical Pacific, aka El Nino, as well as long-term climate trends.
"The prediction for a warmer than normal winter season does not mean we won't have winter weather," said Mike Halpert, lead seasonal forecaster at the NOAA Climate Prediction Center. "What it does mean is that on average this will be a milder than average winter across much of the North, with fewer arctic air outbreaks."
That means snow-dependent businesses have to work harder and hope for the best.
Daytime highs approached 50 degrees last week in the Adirondack village of Lake Placid. The outdoor oval speed skating track overlooking Main Street used its refrigeration system to make ice for afternoon practices and evening public skating. On Whiteface Mountain 10 miles away, about 100 snow guns, silenced for a few days last week, were firing Tuesday with temperatures in the high 20s. There were 11 trails and four lifts open.
The National Weather Service snow map showed up to 20 accumulated inches at the northern edges of Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont, but most of New York and New England were bare Tuesday.
"There's certainly a lot less snow falling now than there was in the '60s and the '70s," said Sandy Calogiere of New York's Olympic Regional Development Authority, which manages venues from the 1932 and 1980 Olympic Games. "We're seeing it here, where the winter starts a little later and it ends a little sooner."
Last week, New Hampshire released $1.4 million in grants to snowmobile clubs for trail grooming and maintenance. But so far, there's no snow to groom on the more than 7,000 miles of trails in the state.
"It's been so warm that the ground hasn't started to freeze," said Bernie Ross, president of the Umbagog Snowmobile Association in Errol. "We need snow and lots of it, but we need some cold, too, to freeze up the streams and open areas where there is still water."
The lack of snow and snowmobilers is hurting northern towns dependent on tourism dollars, including Pittsburg, Errol, Colebrook, Lancaster and Berlin. There was little snow all last winter, which put a dent in snowmobile registrations.
"Registrations were down last year," said Fish and Game Maj. Tim Acerno. "So far this year, we're down 10,000 to 15,000 and I've never seen that much of a drop in one year."
In Maine, Bath Country Club had 75 golfers show up on Sunday and plans a scramble tournament Dec. 31 if the weather holds. Nonesuch River Golf Club in Scarborough, which opened for a weekend during a thaw last January, has now been open during 11 months in 2006 - a first.
Toddy Brook Golf course in North Yarmouth closed on Dec. 3 and reopened last Thursday. On Saturday, more than 100 rounds were played.
"It looks like we'll be open through Christmas and beyond, weather permitting," said Mike Smith, general manager at Toddy Brook. "If we're open on Jan. 1, that'll be 11 straight months. That's unheard of in Maine."
Melissa Rousseau of the Bousquet Ski Area in Pittsfield, Mass., said the resort is closed and had no snow on the ground approaching the Christmas weekend that typically accounts for one-third of its annual income. "Normally, at this time of the year we would have, during a weekday, maybe 25 employees and on a weekend maybe 100," she said.
"If we can make snow, we'd probably be able to make maybe 50 percent of what we would normally make," Rousseau said. Bousquet plans to reopen Thursday.
In Vermont, where snow-covered mountains are a $1.5 billion-a-year business, everyone from lift operators to restaurant owners fears a winter of disappointment.
In Stowe, Vt., only seven of Stowe Mountain Resort's 48 trails were open Monday, with blue skies and temperatures in the high-40s.
"I know a lot of people are praying to the god of their choice" for snow, said Mike Colbourn, vice president of marketing and sales. "One big snowstorm and we're in business. It's going to happen. It has to happen."
On Tuesday, it was snowing lightly, and Stowe had seven trails open.
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Post by Swamp Gas on Dec 20, 2006 7:40:08 GMT -5
thetyee.ca/Mediacheck/2006/05/02/PaidtoDenyGlobalWarming/The Global Warming Denial LobbyHarper: Canada is key to defeating Kyoto The people out to 'poison the debate on climate change.' By Donald Gutstein Published: May 2, 2006 In early April, the Financial Post published a letter addressed to Prime Minister Stephen Harper and signed by 60 "accredited experts in climate and related scientific disciplines," as they describe themselves. They want Harper to begin a debate on the Kyoto Protocol. Begin a debate? What do they think has been happening since 1988, when US National Aeronautics and Space Administration scientist James Hansen testified before the US Congress that he was "99 percent certain that global warming was here." That statement has been subjected to extensive, prolonged and worldwide scrutiny ever since. The point of their letter is to deny "alarmist forecasts" of global warming and to attack "the confident pronouncements of scientifically unqualified environmental groups" whose goal is to capture "sensational headlines." The letter is classic climate change denial and among the 60 signatories -- only 19 of whom are Canadian -- are the most prominent climate change sceptics, as they are frequently called. The deniers' letter was followed two weeks later by one from 90 supporters of Kyoto. This group calls itself "climate science leaders from the academic, public and private sectors across Canada." No foreigners, no weasel phrases like "related scientific disciplines" (economics? agronomy?). Their point? The evidence is conclusive that warming has occurred and most of it is attributable to human activity. These conclusions, they say, are supported by the vast majority of the world's climate scientists. Harper's assignment is to get on with developing an "effective national strategy" to deal with climate change. More debate or action? Financial Post editor Terence Corcoran seems to think that more debate is required. He did run the letter from the Kyoto supporters but accompanied it with an editorial attacking their credibility. Their crime is that some of them are federal government scientists and some have received peer-reviewed government grants. Therefore, what they have to say must be rubbish. The problem with libertarians like Corcoran is that they can be so blinded by their ideology -- anything government does is bad -- that they don't see the problems a powerful corporate sector can cause. Call it a case of libertarian looneyism. Funded by Exxon MobilThe 60 deniers had no Corcoran editorial accompanying their letter. A question Corcoran might have asked is how many of the deniers are funded by Exxon Mobil and the coal industry? It's a natural question to pose. The fossil fuel industry doesn't want mandatory limits on CO2 emissions because they would affect profits. It wants Canada and the rest of the world to do what George W. Bush did, establish voluntary standards and provide government subsidies to develop cleaner technologies. To update his knowledge on this issue, Corcoran could read the works of Ross Gelbspan, who has been covering climate change for more than a decade as a reporter for the Boston Globe. Gelbspan discovered in 1995 that some of the leading skeptics were funded by the coal industry. He wrote a book in 1997, The Heat is On, and runs the companion web site, The Heat is Online. Gelbspan's recent book is Boiling Point: How Politicians, Big Oil and Coal, Journalists and Activists are Fueling the Climate Crisis -- and What We Can Do to Avoid Disaster. Corcoran could also check out the May/June 2005 issue of Mother Jones, which tabulated the organizations that received funding from Exxon Mobil between 2000 and 2003 to fight CO2 emission controls. And he could look at the SourceWatch site created by John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton. Using these sources, Corcoran could put together some interesting profiles of the skeptics. Sallie Baliunas is a non-Canadian signatory to the deniers letter. She is a Harvard-Smithsonian Institute astrophysicist who has been giving global warming deniers scientific cover since the mid-1990s. She is a senior scientist at the George C. Marshall Institute (received $310,000 from Exxon Mobil). She co-wrote (with colleague Willie Soon, who did not sign the skeptics letter) the Fraser Institute pamphlet "Global warming: a guide to the science." (The Fraser Institute receives $60,000 a year from Exxon Mobil.) Baliunas is "enviro-sci" host of TechCentralStation.com (received $95,000 from Exxon Mobil) and is on science advisory boards of the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow ($252,000) and the Annapolis Center for Science-Based Public Policy ($427,500). She has given speeches before the American Enterprise Institute ($960,000) and the Heritage Foundation ($340,000). The Heartland Institute ($312,000) publishes her op-ed pieces. Why is Exxon Mobil so taken with Baliunas? With her colleague Willie Soon, she first claimed that solar effects could account for the earth's warming. When that theory was debunked, they next wrote a paper, partially funded by the American Petroleum Institute says Mother Jones, that claims the twentieth century hasn't been all that warm. The paper quickly became a mini-bible for deniers. But the editor of the journal where the paper was published resigned, saying it never should have been published because of a deficient peer-review process. Exxon Mobil has been astonishingly successful in delaying action on global warming for more than a decade. During that time, oil revenues soared, Exxon took over Mobil for US $82 billion and in 2005, the combined company earned the largest profit in human history at $36 billion. That was the year Exxon Mobil CEO Lee Raymond retired. As thanks for his work on behalf of shareholders -- the stock price soared over 500 percent over the decade -- he received a retirement package valued at nearly $400 million. Sceptic in demand Closer to home, one of the 19 Canadian signatories to the skeptics letter is Tim Ball, a retired professor of climatology from the University of Winnipeg, now living in Victoria. As a global-warming sceptic, he is in high demand by the front groups sponsored by the fossil fuel industry. Ball's particular niche is the argument that since 1940, the world's climate has actually been cooling. The conclusion of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, reached by over 2,000 climate scientists, that the world is heating up is wrong, he says, because it used "distorted records." Undistorted records in hand, Ball is promoted by the National Center for Public Policy Research ($225,000 from Exxon Mobil), and Tech Central Station (which also receives support from General Motors). He's a hot topic on the Coalblog web site, sponsored by the coal companies. In the past year, he's given policy briefings to the Fraser Institute and the Frontier Centre for Public Policy in Winnipeg. You could have found him and Baliunas at a conference in Ottawa in November 2002, just days before parliament ratified the Kyoto Protocol. That conference, urging the government not to proceed with ratification, was paid for by Imperial Oil (Exxon Mobil's Canadian subsidiary) and Talisman Energy and put together by public relations firm APCO Worldwide. APCO's assignment for Imperial Oil was to bring together a roster of climate change skeptics to reveal Kyoto's "science and technology fatal flaws." An APCO specialty is supporting rogue scientists who are financed by industry and purport to challenge established scientific thinking. APCO organized The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition, which was originally funded by the Philip Morris Company, to attack epidemiological studies which implicated environmental tobacco smoke in slightly increased rates of lung cancer in non-smokers. Such studies could not be allowed to stand, given the tobacco industry's claim that harm from smoking was regrettable but due to individual choice, not second-hand smoke. This work was essential in Philip Morris' efforts to limit the impact of passive smoking regulations. APCO then widened the financial catchment to include other companies with poisoning or polluting problems. The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition was so successful that it was assigned a lead role in opposing Kyoto. Vancouver PR whistleblower And that makes Jim Hoggan mad. Hoggan runs one of the largest PR firms in Western Canada. PR practitioners rarely criticize the work of their colleagues, but Hoggan pulls no punches in his scathing denunciation of the global warming deniers and their public relations advisors. In December 2005, he set up his blog, which he calls deSmogBlog. In his personal manifesto, "Slamming the Climate Skeptic Scam," he writes "it is infuriating -- as a public relations professional -- to watch my colleagues use their skills, their training and their considerable intellect to poison the international debate on climate change." It's powerful reading. Hoggan recently broke the story that one of the 19 Canadian deniers had recanted, saying he was misled about the letter's content when he signed on. True, the Hoggan firm does work for organizations that do not spring to mind when thinking about environmental protection -- Delta Land Development and Sea-to-Sky Highway Improvement Project, for instance. And organized labour would be no fan of his. He has an "extensive" background representing companies involved in labour disputes. And he has Partnerships BC as a client. But he's not afraid to list his clients on his web site, in contrast to many PR firms. And Hoggan has a large pro bono practice in which he represents clients like the David Suzuki Foundation, one of the most consistent targets of the deniers. He's also creating a market niche around the issue of sustainability. In a recent post, Hoggan discusses a column by Globe and Mail columnist John Ibbitson, who complains that here's a letter from 90 scientists urging action; there's a letter from 60 scientists urging Harper to ignore calls to action. "What's a layman to do?" Ibbitson whines. His solution? Forget about global warming and instead work with the US to improve air quality. "After all," he writes, "a continental agreement on air quality would do far more to improve the lives of both Americans and Canadians than any actions specifically targeted at reducing greenhouse-gas emissions." It's called bait and switch. We're alarmed about the health of the planet our grandchildren will inherit. But (thanks to the lies and deceptions of the deniers) nobody can agree on what's happening, let alone what should be done. So let's do something that we can all agree on instead. Ibbitson's column makes clear the political purpose of the deniers' letter -- to help Harper out of a tight corner. His goal of capturing a majority government depends on winning seats in Ontario and Quebec, the provinces where support for Kyoto is strongest. He could court their support by giving them Kyoto, but this would infuriate his oil industry masters. These are people like Gwyn Morgan, retired CEO of EnCana Corp., long-time Fraser institute trustee and generous Conservative Party funder who Harper placed in charge of vetting all senior government appointments. So obfuscate, confuse and divert attention to clean air is the order of the day. Why Canada is key Why would 41 foreign deniers be concerned about what happens in Canada? Because what happens in Canada will shift the momentum towards or away from Kyoto. There's a larger issue, too. In 2007, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is expected to warn governments that global warming could drive the Earth's temperature far higher than previously forecast. The UK's Royal Society, in a confidential internal memo leaked to The Guardian last month, predicts that the lobbyists will try to undermine the IPCC's report. "There are already signs these groups will be targeting European countries and Canada to seek to provoke opposition to the Kyoto protocol." And thanks to deniers for hire and newspapers like the National Post that spread their baloney, their task will be made that much easier.
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Post by altitudelou on Dec 20, 2006 21:05:40 GMT -5
"Begin a debate? What do they think has been happening since 1988, when US National Aeronautics and Space Administration scientist James Hansen testified before the US Congress that he was "99 percent certain that global warming was here." That statement has been subjected to extensive, prolonged and worldwide scrutiny ever since." _______________________________________________________
Hell, "Begin debate",as I recall, there was considerable debate going on among the worlds leading climate scientist and government agencies back in the early 1970's, who are these stinking revisionist that can not or do not want to remember the truth and history of Global Warming, seems all these f#ckers think about is their bottom line and not ours, as in , We The People Get It, so why don't they ?
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Post by altitudelou on Dec 23, 2006 13:20:58 GMT -5
Yes, it's raining and 49 degrees here in Maine today, December 23rd when it should be 28 degrees and snowing.
My old friend Bill Marvel has a few words to say about our changing climate in his column in the Conway Daily Sun today. _____________________________________
12/23/2006
Christmas Rain William Marvel
—The worst thing about winter was always the driving. For nearly a decade we lived on Davis Hill with a collection of two-wheel-drive cars and trucks, and the dogleg turn before the steepest portion of the hill left us perennially wondering whether we could maintain enough momentum to take us over the crest. Despite several bolts of beech thrown in the back of his pickup, my father often had to back down the hill in a driving snowstorm for another try, or bare freezing fingers to clamp chains around the rear tires. Once, when I was in the seventh grade, we turned the corner at the bottom of the hill a little too quickly, skidding deep into the snowbank. In the two hours of shoveling that followed I learned a lot of new words, some of which my classmates translated for me the next day. One of them has become a favorite word of mine, especially when I hit my head. Come to think of it, it’s actually two words, and I often repeat them whenever I see snow starting to fall. So did my father. Deep snow predominated only a few decades ago. Pictures developed in March of 1957 show a six-foot lumber pile completely covered in our field. The station wagon that served as our bus from Pine Tree School often had to drop me at the beginning of our road when town plows fell behind, and several times during the 1960s I slogged the last mile through more than a foot of snow to reach the house. A 48-inch blizzard delayed my departure for basic training by three days, and immediately after I left another 44-inch storm hammered northern New Hampshire, collapsing the Berlin ice arena and closing back roads like ours for a week. I spent much of my youth shoveling myself out of snowdrifts, or pushing other people back onto the road. In 1971 I fled winter altogether, cruising warmer climes in a $100 station wagon with a mattress in the back, but the next year I returned with that old clunker, which blew a fuse whenever I turned on the wipers and the headlights at the same time. During a snowstorm one night I ran out of spare fuses and substituted a .22 long rifle cartridge, which worked for a few minutes, but after an unusually loud bang the lights went out and the car coasted to a stop. The fuse panel consisted of a smoldering tangle of dangling wires. Checking the contents of my wallet, I saw that I faced the rest of the winter on foot. That would have been impossible in the backwater Conway then was, so I emigrated to Boston for a year of employment within walking distance. Winters remained fierce even there, with lots of snow and strong winds, but the lack of an automobile vastly mitigated the misery of travel, besides easing the expenses and complications of life. Those old terrors trouble the modern New Englander but little. Front-wheel-drive and all-wheel-drive cars encourage motorists to travel in all types of weather, and to expect road crews to accommodate them with environmentally destructive bare-pavement policies. Now, when a speeding flathead skates over a patch of ice and kills someone, it somehow becomes a municipal failure. Massive increases in winter traffic appear to be accompanied by a significant deterioration in the average operator’s competence, which is only aggravated as milder winters reduce familiarity with frozen, snowy conditions. Paradoxically, driving in the snow seems more dangerous than ever now that climate change has diminished the severity of our winters. Around 1980, bare ground and winter rainstorms began to elicit puzzled comments from old-timers who remembered little of those conditions. Ice storms, like the one that devastated New England nine years ago next month, awakened the more inattentive that warmer air was in the wind. Increasingly later dates for snow cover have convinced all but those in corporate denial that we have done something terrible to our atmosphere. The only thing I can’t understand is why the ski industry hasn’t figured it out yet. If a ten-week season was too short for economic survival in 1976, it surely can’t be enough in 2006, and the winters are only going to grow shorter. The handwriting is on the wall for the industry that turned our rural region into today’s thriving tourist mecca. Put that way, it seems a pity global warming didn’t come along half a century ago.
William Marvel lives in South Conway, New Hampshire.
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Post by socrates on Dec 23, 2006 14:20:26 GMT -5
In Boston, it is 56 degrees with overcast and drizzle.
I agree with the author above that the turning of the Northeast into a Virginia like climate has resulted in too many here forgetting how to drive in snow.
I remember driving in white out conditions in 1995. I had to pull the car over and wait it out. Even when there was clear visibility, one knew they had to drive very slowly. Perhaps with the warming trends, people here are now more attuned to "black ice". Yet, when the snow hits again, hopefully there won't be too many accidents because people forgot how cars can easily skid and go out of control on snow covered roads.
(off topic)The "Big Dig" is an example of the backward planning of corporate controlled legislatures. All that money wasted could have been put into mass transportation. Sure, Boston looks a lot better now, but the roads still can't support the ever increasing traffic. The carpool lanes now allow vehicles with two people in it because the congestion is so bad. It used to only allow those with three or more.
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Post by Thetaloops on Dec 29, 2006 8:54:29 GMT -5
Well, the evidence of Global Warming continues to come in. Gigantic ice plates breaking off into the sea. Whatever may be causing it. The sun or green house effect, this is not good. We are 150 ft above sea level, I hope this is enough to keep the water out of our cellar. We may need to get a canoe to get to the train station though. Ancient ice shelf breaks free in Canadian Arctic Breakaway may 'signal the onset of accelerated change,' researchers say Updated: 1 hour, 4 minutes ago TORONTO - A giant ice shelf has snapped free from an island south of the North Pole, scientists said Thursday, citing climate change as a “major” reason for the event. The Ayles Ice Shelf — all 41 square miles of it — broke clear 16 months ago from the coast of Ellesmere Island, about 500 miles south of the North Pole in the Canadian Arctic. Scientists discovered the event by using satellite imagery. Within one hour of breaking free, the shelf had formed as a new ice island, leaving a trail of icy boulders floating in its wake. Warwick Vincent of Laval University, who studies Arctic conditions, traveled to the newly formed ice island and couldn’t believe what he saw. “This is a dramatic and disturbing event. It shows that we are losing remarkable features of the Canadian North that have been in place for many thousands of years,” Vincent said. “We are crossing climate thresholds, and these may signal the onset of accelerated change ahead.” The ice shelf was one of six major shelves remaining in Canada’s Arctic. They are packed with ancient ice that is more than 3,000 years old. They float on the sea but are connected to land. 'Consistent with climate change' Some scientists say it is the largest event of its kind in Canada in 30 years and that climate change was a major element. “It is consistent with climate change,” Vincent said, adding that the remaining ice shelves are 90 percent smaller than when they were first discovered in 1906. “We aren’t able to connect all of the dots ... but unusually warm temperatures definitely played a major role.” Laurie Weir, who monitors ice conditions for the Canadian Ice Service, was poring over satellite images in 2005 when she noticed that the shelf had split and separated. Weir notified Luke Copland, head of the new global ice lab at the University of Ottawa, who initiated an effort to find out what happened. Using U.S. and Canadian satellite images, as well as seismic data — the event registered on earthquake monitors 155 miles away — Copland discovered that the ice shelf collapsed in the early afternoon of Aug. 13, 2005. Copland said the speed with which climate change has effected the ice shelves has surprised scientists. “Even 10 years ago scientists assumed that when global warming changes occur that it would happen gradually so that perhaps we expected these ice shelves just to melt away quite slowly,” he said. Derek Mueller, a polar researcher with Vincent’s team, said the ice shelves get weaker and weaker as temperatures rise. He visited Ellesmere Island in 2002 and noticed that another ice shelf had cracked in half. “We’re losing our ice shelves and this a feature of the landscape that is in danger of disappearing altogether from Canada,” Mueller said. Within days of breaking free, the Ayles Ice Shelf drifted about 30 miles offshore before freezing into the sea ice. A spring thaw may bring another concern: that warm temperatures will release the new ice island from its Arctic grip, making it an enormous hazard for ships. “Over the next few years this ice island could drift into populated shipping routes,” Weir said.
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Post by Thetaloops on Dec 29, 2006 8:58:11 GMT -5
The polar bears are not too happy about all of this global warming either, whatever combination of nature and humananity is causing this. We are in for a rough ride.
U.S. wants polar bears listed as threatened Designation could propel action on global warming
• In danger? Dec. 27: Global warming could threaten the polar bear population and drive the animals to extinction. MSNBC.com's Dara Brown reports.
Updated: 11:16 p.m. ET Dec 26, 2006 The Bush administration has decided to propose listing the polar bear as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, putting the U.S. government on record as saying that global warming could drive one of the world's most recognizable animals out of existence.
The administration's proposal — which was described by an Interior Department official who spoke on the condition of anonymity — stems from the fact that rising temperatures in the Arctic are shrinking the sea ice that polar bears need for hunting. The official insisted on anonymity because the department will submit the proposal today for publication in the Federal Register, after which it will be subject to public comment for 90 days.
Identifying polar bears as threatened with extinction could have an enormous political and practical impact. As the world's largest bear and as an object of children's affection as well as Christmastime Coca-Cola commercials, the polar bear occupies an important place in the American psyche. Because scientists have concluded that carbon dioxide from power-plant and vehicle emissions is helping drive climate change worldwide, putting polar bears on the endangered species list raises the legal question of whether the government would be required to compel U.S. industries to curb their carbon dioxide output.
"We've reviewed all the available data that leads us to believe the sea ice the polar bear depends on has been receding," said the Interior official, who added that U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials have concluded that polar bears could be endangered within 45 years. "Obviously, the sea ice is melting because the temperatures are warmer."
Northern latitudes are warming twice as rapidly as the rest of globe, according to a 2004 scientific assessment, and by the end of the century, annual ocean temperatures in the Arctic may rise an additional 13 degrees Fahrenheit. As a result, researchers predict that summer sea ice, which polar bears use as a platform to hunt for ringed seals, will decline 50 to 100 percent. Just this month, researchers at the National Center for Atmospheric Research outlined a worst-case scenario in which summer sea ice could disappear by 2040.
By submitting the proposal today, the Interior Department is meeting a deadline under a legal settlement with three environmental advocacy groups — the Center for Biological Diversity, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Greenpeace — that argue the government has failed to respond quickly enough to the polar bear's plight. The department has been examining the status of polar bears for more than two years.
NRDC senior attorney Andrew Wetzler, one of the lawyers who filed suit against the administration, welcomed the proposal for listing.
‘A loud recognition’ "It's such a loud recognition that global warming is real," Wetzler said. "It is rapidly threatening the polar bear and, in fact, an entire ecosystem with utter destruction."
There are 20,000 to 25,000 polar bears worldwide, 4,700 of which live in Alaska and spend part of the year in Canada and Russia. The other countries with polar bears in their Arctic regions are Denmark and Norway.
Although scientists have yet to fully assess many of the 19 separate polar bear populations, initial studies suggest that climate change has already exacted a toll on the animals.
The ice in Canada's western Hudson Bay is now breaking up 2 1/2 weeks earlier than it did 30 years ago, giving polar bears there less time to hunt and build up fat reserves that sustain them for eight months before hunting resumes. As local polar bears have become thinner, female polar bears' reproductive rates and cubs' survival rates have fallen, spurring a 21 percent population drop from 1997 to 2004.
Scientists have not charted the same rapid decline within the U.S. polar bear populations, but federal scientists have observed a number of troubling signs as the bears have resorted to open-water swimming and even cannibalism in an effort to stay alive.
Polar bears normally swim from one patch of sea ice to another to hunt for food, but they are not accustomed to going long distances. In September 2004, government scientists observed 55 polar bears swimming offshore in the Alaskan Beaufort Sea, an unprecedented spike, and four of those bears died. In a separate study that year, federal scientists identified three instances near the Beaufort Sea in which polar bears ate one another.
The Interior official said government officials studying Alaskan polar bears in the southern Beaufort Sea area have observed thinner adult bears and a lower rate of survival among cubs. Although the population has yet to dip, "unless the polar cub survival rate goes up, it would have to happen," the official said.
Still, the official added that the decision to propose polar bears as threatened with extinction "wasn't easy for us" because "there is still some significant uncertainty" about what could happen to bear populations in the future.
"This proposal is sort of like a scientific hypothesis. You put this out there and say to the world, 'Tell us, is this right or is this wrong?' " the official said, adding that Interior will hold several public hearings about its proposal. "We're projecting what we think will happen in the future, not just what's happening at this moment."
Up to a year The department could take up to a year to complete its proposal, and it could abandon the listing if it unearths new scientific projections about the bears' fate. But that appears unlikely, as recent models have consistently pointed to a faster deterioration of Arctic sea ice.
Although federal officials cited rising sea temperatures once before in a threatened species proposal — in May, when they called them a "major stressor" on Caribbean elkhorn and staghorn corals — today's proposal will mark the first time the administration has identified climate change as the driving force behind the potential demise of a species.
Robert Correll, the scientist who chaired the international Arctic Climate Impact Assessment in 2004 and now directs the global change program at the H. John Heinz III Center for Science, Economics and the Environment, said in an interview that the proposal to place polar bears on the endangered species list is "highly justified."
Correll added that he is participating in an administration-funded study at the Center for Strategic and International Studies on how climate change could affect national security and foreign policy.
That, along with the proposal on polar bears, he said, "plays into a reality that, in my opinion, they're going to be rethinking their position" on global warming.
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Post by et in Arcadia ego on Dec 29, 2006 9:21:30 GMT -5
When this 66 square kilometer ice island floats into and destroys a couple offshore oil rigs maybe these idiots will drop the pretending.. ___________________________________ www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/12/29/canada.arctic.ap/index.htmlTORONTO, Ontario (AP) -- A giant ice shelf the size of 11,000 football fields has snapped free from Canada's Arctic, scientists said. The mass of ice broke clear 16 months ago from the coast of Ellesmere Island, about 800 kilometers (497 miles) south of the North Pole, but no one was present to see it in Canada's remote north. Scientists using satellite images later noticed that it became a newly formed ice island in just an hour and left a trail of icy boulders floating in its wake. (Watch the satellite images that clued in ice watchers) Warwick Vincent of Laval University, who studies Arctic conditions, traveled to the newly formed ice island and could not believe what he saw. "This is a dramatic and disturbing event. It shows that we are losing remarkable features of the Canadian North that have been in place for many thousands of years. We are crossing climate thresholds, and these may signal the onset of accelerated change ahead," Vincent said Thursday. In 10 years of working in the region he has never seen such a dramatic loss of sea ice, he said. The collapse was so powerful that earthquake monitors 250 kilometers (155 miles) away picked up tremors from it. The Ayles Ice Shelf, roughly 66 square kilometers (41 square miles) in area, was one of six major ice shelves remaining in Canada's Arctic. Scientists say it is the largest event of its kind in Canada in 30 years and point their fingers at climate change as a major contributing factor. "It is consistent with climate change," Vincent said, adding that the remaining ice shelves are 90 percent smaller than when they were first discovered in 1906. "We aren't able to connect all of the dots ... but unusually warm temperatures definitely played a major role." Laurie Weir, who monitors ice conditions for the Canadian Ice Service, was poring over satellite images in 2005 when she noticed that the shelf had split and separated. Weir notified Luke Copland, head of the new global ice lab at the University of Ottawa, who initiated an effort to find out what happened. Using U.S. and Canadian satellite images, as well as data from seismic monitors, Copland discovered that the ice shelf collapsed in the early afternoon of August 13, 2005. "What surprised us was how quickly it happened," Copland said. "It's pretty alarming. "Even 10 years ago scientists assumed that when global warming changes occur that it would happen gradually so that perhaps we expected these ice shelves just to melt away quite slowly, but the big surprise is that for one they are going, but secondly that when they do go, they just go suddenly, it's all at once, in a span of an hour." Within days, the floating ice shelf had drifted a few miles (kilometers) offshore. It traveled west for 50 kilometers (31 miles) until it finally froze into the sea ice in the early winter. The Canadian ice shelves are packed with ancient ice that dates back over 3,000 years. They float on the sea but are connected to land. Derek Mueller, a polar researcher with Vincent's team, said the ice shelves get weaker and weaker as the temperature rises. He visited Ellesmere's Ward Hunt Ice Shelf in 2002 and noticed it had cracked in half. "We're losing our ice shelves, and this a feature of the landscape that is in danger of disappearing altogether from Canada," Mueller said. "In the global perspective Antarctica has many ice shelves bigger than this one, but then there is the idea that these are indicators of climate change." The spring thaw may bring another concern as the warming temperatures could release the ice shelf from its Arctic grip. Prevailing winds could then send the ice island southwards, deep into the Beaufort Sea. "Over the next few years this ice island could drift into populated shipping routes," Weir said. "There's significant oil and gas development in this region as well, so we'll have to keep monitoring its location over the next few years." Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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Post by Swamp Gas on Dec 29, 2006 22:06:36 GMT -5
Exxon/Mobil fiddles as the world melts.........
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Post by BigBunny on Dec 29, 2006 23:29:17 GMT -5
Just think. The Northwest passage as a trade route may become a reality.
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Post by altitudelou on Jan 1, 2007 12:20:02 GMT -5
Human induced Global Warming or natural climatic cycle, there is no disputing that our climate is changing and the effects are being felt more and more with each passing day. As the climate changes so must the way we live our lives. _____________________________________________________ www.oregonlive.com/special/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1167375325141680.xml&coll=7Northwest forecast: dramatic change Our warmer world - The debate over what to do about global warming remains divisive. But few scientists dispute we live on a planet where temperatures are higher than they were a century ago and will continue to climb. In the Pacific Northwest - a place defined by glacier-clad mountains, rivers and the sea - the effects are now seen and measurable. In this sixth report in an occasional series, The Oregonian examines how higher temperatures exert fundamental change on the Northwest's natural world and built environment. Sunday, December 31, 2006 MICHAEL MILSTEIN Fine wine, abundant electricity, wild salmon -- the things Oregonians take for granted. But keeping them will be harder than ever because we plan and build our lives in the belief that Northwest weather will always be Northwest weather. It's not so, researchers are finding. We should expect hotter, drier heat waves, heavier rains and quicker snowmelt. The Northwest, a natural target of major storms, will feel it in ways other regions will not. It particularly challenges public agencies and private businesses, which now must expect climate curveballs, such as the record-setting November deluge -- Portland's wettest month since 1938, Seattle's wettest in 115 years. Warmer summers already have altered the taste of Oregon's signature pinot noir wines, and vintners are shifting their vines uphill to keep them cool. But that will not be enough. By the end of the century, the iconic grape of the state's $1 billion wine industry will grow better along Washington's Puget Sound than it does in the Willamette Valley. Volcanic debris once locked in place by Mount Hood's ice, now exposed by melting glaciers, ripped away miles of Oregon 35 during the November storm. Crews hurriedly pieced it back together at a cost of $10 million, just in time for ski season, but only a far more costly fix will fortify the road against escalating floods bearing yet more boulders. "We have to ask, 'Do we want to spend hundreds of millions rebuilding things the way they are?' " says Gail Achterman, a member of the state highway commission and director of the Institute for Natural Resources at Oregon State University. "These events are not going to stop happening, and every climate model suggests they're going to happen more often." It's impossible to blame a single storm on global warming. But research shows the November blast was a preview of events we will see more often: heavier rain earlier in the winter; rain falling in place of snow, even in the mountains; all that extra rain rushing downstream in floods. The trouble, scientists say, is that society does not view climate as something that substantially shifts. "Our vulnerability to climate is based on the expectation that climate is predictable," says Nathan Mantua, a research scientist at the University of Washington's Climate Impacts Group. "We in our minds are driving on cruise control thinking the road's going to stay straight. We don't realize it can change drastically." Instruments track nearly every snowflake and raindrop falling across the West, all so federal forecasters can tell us how much water will flow to our farm fields and faucets each year. But their forecasts, vital to the region's farmers and water managers, are drifting off the mark. "In the early '80s, the skill really began to drop off," says Tom Pagano, a water supply forecaster with the U.S. Natural Resources Conservation Service in Portland who documented the trend. The climate's to blame. In a way forecasters had never seen, it's veering wildly between wet and dry and cool and hot. Weather is so complex it's impossible to identify warming as the cause. But the swings complicate life in a region already changing as it warms. Rising temperatures are a certainty for the Northwest and already have begun to shift snow and runoff patterns vital to salmon migration and hydroelectric power. It is less clear how mounting greenhouse gases will affect rainfall and other weather patterns. But climate projections show higher temperatures intensifying droughts and storms in the Northwest -- a kind of climatic bull's-eye. Here's how: Evaporation off a warmer ocean injects more water into the air, which absorbs ever more water as it warms. That fuels stronger storms that carry bigger buckets of rain and snow onto land, according to studies by the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo. Average annual precipitation has risen across much of the region since 1920, University of Washington studies show. The storms are expected to collide more directly with the Cascade Range, which may wring yet more moisture from the clouds, says Eric Salathe, a Climate Impacts Group research scientist. Already, he says, winter storms arrive earlier. December once was the rainiest month in much of the Northwest, now it's November, data show. Last month, almost 50 inches fell in Oregon's Coast Range west of Salem, beating a December 1996 record that was thought to be unbreakable. Even without wetter storms, the Northwest still will see more rain. That's because the predicted warming of one quarter to 1 degree per decade this century will turn much of the Northwest's snow to rain. Snow accumulation in the mountains at the end of each winter has declined about 25 percent since about 1920, according to Phil Mote, Washington state's official climatologist. It'll get worse: By the 2090s, the Northwest's mountain snows will melt almost three months sooner than they do now, UW projections show. Problem: As more rain falls, the same rivers and streams are left to drain an overwhelming amount of runoff. Outcome: flooding. The west side of the Cascades, where a slight rise in winter temperatures will turn a lot of snow to rain, is especially vulnerable, says Alan Hamlet, a UW research scientist. "That's the area we should really worry about, where risks have already gone up and where they will probably continue to go up," he says. Complicating the picture is that shrinking snows expose more ground, which absorbs heat and warms the air more, according to studies by Purdue University's Climate Change Research Center. The unlikely flip side of this waterlogged scenario is an increasingly parched summer. That's because rainwater vanishes quickly compared with snowmelt, which will be in shorter supply. Hotter days will only accelerate the drying. Already, 10 percent of the Columbia River's flow at Bonneville Dam has shifted from spring and summer months to fall and winter months since 1929, says Kyle Dittmer, a hydrologist and meteorologist with the Columbia Intertribal Fish Commission. That leaves less water in hotter months, when it's needed to cool streams for salmon and to spin turbines for electricity. The number of extremely hot days in the Northwest will double by the end of this century, the Purdue studies found. The trend has already appeared: Examination of temperature records from 1960 to 1996 by the Northeast Regional Climate Center at Cornell University showed increases in extremely hot days across the Northwest. Oregon vineyards made their reputation with pinot noir, sensitive to heat. The weather must match the grape's preferences precisely for an award-winning wine to emerge. "The cool climate is what we've hung our hat on here," says Harry Peterson-Nedry, founder and managing partner of Chehalem, a leading winery based in Newberg. But growing seasons have turned warmer in only the 30 or so years since Oregon wines took off. So far that has been good, producing superior vintages grown in the ideal window of temperatures for pinot noir. "We have moved to the middle of the window," Peterson-Nedry says. "But the problem is, we're not going to stop there. If we could stop it there, we would." When researchers plotted places that will remain cool enough for Oregon's iconic grape by the end of this century, they were left mainly with a narrow strip along the coast and land to the north around Puget Sound. The shift may present other opportunities, however: The Willamette Valley could become more hospitable to grapes California is known for today. Some wineries already are experimenting with warmer-weather grapes such as syrah, staple of France's hot Rhone Valley and abundant in California. "That's with the anticipation they're going to be planting and harvesting those varieties here someday," Peterson-Nedry says. On the east slope of Mount Hood, highway engineers expect more destructive floods to tear into Oregon 35. It's happened five times in the past eight years. Glaciers are melting faster, exposing even more unstable debris to future, wetter storms. The same thing happened at Mount Rainier National Park, shut down by the record November rains. Geologists say the retreating glaciers have released so much extra sediment into river channels that streams flow dangerously high -- dooming roads tourists have driven for nearly a century. Crews on Mount Hood installed larger culverts to shunt more water under Oregon 35 in a furious push to reopen the road, vital to the ski industry. But the Oregon Department of Transportation admits they will not withstand another deluge. The agency lacks the money for a bigger fix, which could involve larger bridges over the unpredictable White River and cost more than $70 million. The state hopes to persuade federal authorities to foot the bill, arguing that such a big price tag will save money in the long run by avoiding repeated repairs. The rule of thumb for the Federal Highway Administration is to balance those costs over the next 20 years, says David Cox, division administrator for Oregon. "We look at a much shorter horizon than you would think," he says. But the implications of global warming do not end in 20 years. By then, the climate may be changing even faster and in more unexpected ways, researchers say. Although scientists are a conservative bunch, some worry we have underestimated how sensitive the climate is. Change feeds on itself. This month, new findings showed the Arctic may lose its summer ice by 2040. That exposes more water, which absorbs more sunlight, which warms an ocean already heating rapidly. "Things are happening now almost faster than we can predict them," says Richard Gammon, a UW chemistry and oceanography professor. "Right now, the scientists are more alarmed than the general public." Michael Milstein: 503-294-7689; michaelmilstein@news.oregonian.com
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Post by Thetaloops on Jan 1, 2007 12:58:47 GMT -5
We had better start some fast construction of a floating city here or in space. I miss the discussions we had in the late 70's about Gerald O'Neill's L-5 Space Cylinder that would be a first step in saving the human race. This kind of thinking has been pushed so far into the back ground. And the general population has been so dumbed down that they don't even think that these things are possible. And they are possible if we were able to put our heads, hearts and finances into it. Maybe the melting of the ice caps are inevitable in the life of the planet. But, what is being done about it. Not much. Maybe TPTB like it that way, only a few surviving? Or they think that the Apocalypse is coming and that life here is going to end. I don't see it that way. Why are all these untapped possibilities here?
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