Good News on Global Warming

TheSync writes "OK, CO2 levels are rising, but iAfrica has a report that atmospheric methane concentrations are leveling off. Methane is the second most important greenhouse gas, accounting for one fifth of total warming. Researchers don't know why this is."

Comments

CoboyNeal stopped farting?

[Bazzargh]

'nuff said.

Inverse Time Capsule

[Midnight Warrior]

Time Capsule From the Future Appears

WASHINGTON - A time capsule appeared today in an astonishing moment directly on the front steps of a federal court house here in the D.C. area. When authorities opened the capsule, a three items were neatly bundled together: a printout of an article from iAfrica.com published in late 2003, a paper describing a scientific study performed an astonishing 50 years from now, and a memo addressed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The memo requests that the Supreme Court re-open environmental laws that attempt to reduce greenhouse emissions around the world. The memo goes on to cite the attached scientific paper which says that eliminating the greenhouse effect caused the earth's atmosphere to thinned out so much that space debris now [50 years from now] reigns down around the planet almost constantly. The memo states that the thinning out of the atmosphere was due to a connection between greenhouse gases and the density of the atmosphere at its highest levels.

A brief review of the scientific paper shows that scientists knew of the connection early on, but environmentallist groups penetrated the scientific study panels and had the notion dismissed as a feeble attempt to thwart progress. Later history showed environmentallist groups stating that they did not knowingly hide such connections, but that were aware that some individual may have done so, and in any case, such action should not place the blame for the failures on their organizations.

Similar capsules appeared in other locations around the world, but mass riots suddenly appeared and the capsules were destroyed before their contents could be examined.

Re:Inverse Time Capsule

[Sylver Dragon]

Actually, its both sides who are playing fast and loose with the facts. One of the things that still irks me to no end, is hearing some enviromentalist go off about how the global temperature has raised so much in the past century. While this is technically true, it ignores the fact that for the first part of the 20th century there was a slight decline in temperature, then the Global Pacific Occilation hit, circa mid-70's, and since then, there has only been a slight increse in global temperature. However, most envromentalists, don't see fit to inform people of this detail. Instead, they just smooth over this natural occurance, and use it to justify thier position.
Fact is, there has been some warming in the past century. Part of this is probably anthropogenic in nature, but you also have to keep in mind that we were comming out of a little ice age at the end of the 19th century, and that the GPO happened in the middle of the data set, which throws it all out of whack, and don't forget that recent studies have shown that solar output had been incresing slowly. While all of these factors together may not account for all of the warming seen in the 20th century, they do account for a good part of it.
This isn't to say that we should abandon all clean air policies. Quite the contrary, we should be working to make the air cleaner (have you ever seen LA in the summer, when the wind isn't blowing?) But, we should at least try and base the arguments on more than Global Warming, which is so poorly understood. Also, blaming one gas so heavily (CO2) is rather dumb, there is a lot more to it than that, but this is what gets center stage, and gets the research dollars.

Re:For those not wanting to click

[stevew]

The problem with all this is that scientists are NOT united in accepting that man is responsible for the temperature going up. Small things like volanic emissions and the variability of the sun have MAJOR affect on our environment.

Things just aren't THAT simple!

Re:Not yet understood

[meta-monkey]

That's because global warming is junk science.

Is it happening? We don't know for sure.

Should it be happening? Maybe.

Was it even warmer last millenium? Could be.

If there is global climate change, is it our fault? Perhaps.

So what should be done? Throttle all industrial production for first-world nations, and leave third-world nations exempt.

Riiiiiiight...makes sense to me.

Re:Not yet understood

[duffbeer703]

You are absolutely correct. Global warming has been turned into a big deal because scientists & universities hotly compete for government grants.

In the 1600's, Dutch settlers regularly walked or travelled by sled from Manhattan to Brooklyn. During particularly cold winters, one could walk to Staten Island.

The Hudson & East Rivers have not frozen since the early 1800's... I suppose you cannot blame global warming from 400 years ago on SUVs...

In an unrelated story...

[Abraxis]

...stocks in Beano have jumped 225% on reports of record sales last quarter...

(no, not really)

Re:Not yet understood

[fuzzybunny]

Quite probable that there's a lack of understanding.

However, here (Switzerland) we've noticed a _massive_ recession of glaciers over the last 50 years. Like as in >100 meters for a few. Several inhabited areas are pretty seriously threatened, because the build-up of melted glacier water is being held back by the masses of rocks and other crap that glaciers tend to accumulate; a lot of geologists think that there's a pretty heavy danger of huge rockslides when water pressure exceeds the buildup's ability to hold it back. We've had several of these in recent years.

There have also been a number of rock avalances in the alps, when the ice that's been holding large chunks of stuff in place for centuries has melted.

Personally, I tend to believe panicky reports that a lot of lower-lying ski resorts won't have snow by 2030; I've noticed a pretty constant reduction in snow each year since as far back as I can recall (~1980) and that's only about 20 years.

Maybe it's not understood, but _something_ is happening, and it's not all those cows farting.

Correlation != Causation

[wind]

Researchers don't know why this is.

Right. And until they have a solid, convincing theory to account for this 'why', then we've only got (at best) a correlation between the two events - this does not necessarily mean there is a causal relationship between them.

Trouble is, this is such a politicized issue that I doubt we'll ever see any scientific evidence that everyone will consider convincing (for one side or the other).

Re:Correlation != Causation

[Lars T.]

Which two events? There is now less methane in the atmosphere than expected (IOW not more than before). Scientists don't know why. What is the other event?

Re:Correlation != Causation

[Red Rocket]

Correlation != Causation

That's a solid scientific principle.

Another one is that you don't experiment on production systems without some kind of backup. Do you have a backup atmosphere somewhere that we can use if the methane and CO2 we're adding to this one cause it to break? If not, then it's time to put a halt to the experiment.

You can't properly understand a lie

[Spamalamadingdong]

We know (we've seen) that large volcanic eruptions can cause the global temperature to drop several degrees.

True, but this is due to ash and sulfate particulates which screen out sunlight. These fall out of the atmosphere over a period of months.

We also know a single volcano can spew out more CO2 during an eruption than all of industry for the past 200 years.

This statement is not just false, it is a damned lie. The CO2 content of the atmosphere has been measured on a frequent basis for decades. It shows almost no correlation with volcanic activity, but has a seasonal swing on top of an exponential upward curve which is all but certainly from human activity.

Historic volcanic eruptions can't even compete with human emissions of sulfur dioxide. That's how important we are. (If you don't believe me, look at DOE and EPA figures for sulfur emissions vs. recent volcanic eruptions like Pinatubo or El Chicon. If you actually think rather than hold blindly to an ideology, you will find it sobering.)

My point is: Although we have some data, it's inconclusive.

And you use this as a reason to continue a vast, uncontrolled experiment with possibly dire consequences. Why?

An analogy is to claim that you ought to glue yourself into a winter coat because it was cold last month. If it turns out to be hot tomorrow (solar activity continues to increase), the coat (extra greenhouse gases) could kill you from heatstroke. This is the kind of risk we're taking.

Re:You can't properly understand a lie

[Spamalamadingdong]

We do produce around two orders of magnitude more CO2 than volcanic activity each year. Damn. That is a sobering number.

Ain't it the truth. The real scandal is that millions of people "know" otherwise, due to false claims in media like talk radio.

The ash and aerosols from St. Helens and Pinatubo each caused a 2-3 year long 1-2C drop in global temperature.

This is a nit and I don't have time to research it, but I bet you'll find that while the effects might have been detectable for years, the time for which they were of that magnitude was much shorter.

You're proposing that, based on someone's unsubstantiated analysis, we expend Trillions of dollars to make changes that may be unnecessary.

It's not one analysis, it's a whole family of analyses, and even the ones postulating the smallest climactic changes project effects that would turn our world umop apisdn.

The USA has a $10 trillion economy, we are going to be spending trillions to add to, replace or repair infrastructure and durable goods (cars, appliances) anyway. The issue is that each dollar spent locks in the choices for many years into the future, so we need to spend those dollars wisely starting today. If additional money has to be spent (efficiency doesn't always cost more), it can often be recovered from savings down the line. We could recover far more if factors such as defense are considered (giving money to Arab oil producers leads to their promotion of radical Islam in madrassas, with results we can all recount by now). For one example of what we could do fairly easily, take a look at my other post here. I think that doing these things just as insurance is essential.