UK Releases Global Warming Report

ben_ writes "The UK Government's Foresight Project, tasked with visualizing the future, has published a hard-hitting report on the flooding consequences of global warming. The story's also on the BBC."

Comments

I don't buy it

[thebra]

here are some articles that disagree. Articles
This site provides links to resources skeptical of those sort of doomsday scenarios.

Re:I don't buy it

[Kenja]

Thats the same site that claims recycling is a waste of time and caffine isn't adictive. Take it all with a grain of salt.

Re:I don't buy it

[IceAgeComing]

You're not alone, but the size of your camp is dwindling with the growing evidence of the greenhouse effect.

Scientists today:

* know pretty accurately the size of our atmosphere
* know pretty accurately what's in it
* have run controlled experiments showing how much heat is trapped by CO2 and other gasses
* know roughly how much CO2 is being added daily.

Here's what looks like a pretty balanced overview, gleaned through google of course:

http://www.ucsusa.org/global_environment/global_ wa rming/page.cfm?pageID=515#Overview

I can respond to one of your points: it's not necessarily that the earth has never seen the greenhouse effect before, but the rate of its onset may very well be a new phenomenon. There have been massive volcanic eruptions in recent history, such as Krakatoa, but I believe we are producing more CO2 than anything like this.
If the Earth warms up quicker than most species have ever experienced, there is no reason to believe that there wouldn't be massive species upheaval.

Re:I don't buy it

[mikerich]

You know what - it's really not popular, but I don't agree with the doomsday global warming scenarios either. There's a couple of reasons: 1. There's been a measured increase in Solar activity and radiation, which is *where* we get our heat from, obviously. Once the Sun gets over it's current temper tantrum, temperatures will get more moderate.

Already factored into the climate models. The Earth should by now be dipping back towards a glacial episode. Warming since the mid 20th Century appears to be man made.

Additionally, the rate of climate change is almost entirely unprecedented. Whilst global temperatures are not high on the geological timescale they are rising at an extraordinary rate which appears to lack a natural cause.

2. If Dinosaurs ruled a tropical paradise 65 million years ago, wouldn't the current trend of Global Warming just be the Earth returning to a Tropical state?

In short - no. During the Mesozoic both poles were covered by ocean, water could move freely through the oceans, heat was effectively distributed round the globe. Overall temperatures were higher. Since then, Antarctica has slipped over the South Pole and the North Pole is now almost entirely enclosed by land. Oceanic circulation is much more dynamic with cold water forming at the poles and descending to the floor of the oceans - which are only just about freezing point. The warming of these cold waters in the tropics is what holds the temperature way below Mesozoic levels.

3. Isn't is just a little bit arrogant on the part of humanity to assume that we really affect the environment that much?

Not really, we seem to have done a wonderful job devastating the ecologies of places such as Iceland (once had forests), the seasonally dry areas around the deserts which were once productive grasslands and are now deserts, the salinisation of the Middle East and Pakistan thanks to faulty irrigation, we've buggered the Aral Sea beyond recognition, we're busy knackering the Mekong River with badly-thought through hydropower projects, the Colorado only occasionally reaches the sea, god only knows what we've done by carrying rats and cats around the World to places where they were previously unknown. And so on. So actually, no, it would be amazing if we WEREN'T screwing up the atmosphere.

What about bovine methane?

Methane was estimated to produce about 20% of global warming in the 1990s. Its sources are many - melting permafrost, natural gas leaks, swamps are some of the natural ones. However we contribute to it by things such as rice paddies and those huge herds of cattle which just aren't natural.

What about a single volcanic eruption spewing more CFC's then we've ever thought about using?

Errr volcanoes don't spew CFCs. They release carbon dioxide which is a global warming agent, but they also pour out ash, sulphuric acid and hydrogen chloride which serve to depress temperatures.

Best wishes,
Mike.

Re:I don't buy it

[monkeyfamily]

I bet cattle would fart less if we didn't force-feed quite so much them before we killed 'em. And the methane they spew is only a tiny part of the pollution they cause. Ammonia gas, phosphorous, and lotsa microbes and pathogens stream out of every feedlot in enormous quantities.
"For every 10 pounds of nutrients consumed, 8 to 9 pounds are excreted in the feces and urine."
Straight from the USDA.
Does this strike you as wasteful? Did you know the US could feed 800,000,000 people on the grain that's fed to livestock? Let the cows eat grass and save the grain for the starving! Or sell it and take $80 billion off the trade deficit!
Fucking decadent carnivores, messing up the place...

Re:To be honest...

[WOV]

More likely, you've been hearing the same forecasts, and not paying enough attention to the timeframe. Many simulations show that a period of swimming like "Water World" increases the Earth's albdeo sufficiently that it *induces* a new ice age - several decades later. We're not that good at simulating something as complex as the climate out more than a few years. However, please realize that we *are* very good at measuring CO2 and its impact on the atmosphere, and that marginal scientists aside, no other variable - sunspots, orbital precession, yadda, yadda, has changed nearly enough - or in as obviously correlated a fashion - as atmospheric CO2 concentrations. Just because there's still a very very small number of scientists out there who question it does not really mean there's a "difference of opinion in the science community."

Re:flooding

[Daniel Dvorkin]

IIRC, the amount of ice in an iceberg that sits above the waterline is exactly the amount by which the volume shrinks when the ice melts, so the waterline remains the same. The main concern about melting ice and sea levels comes from the Antarctic ice cap, most of which sits on land.

OTOH, it's not just about sea levels; it's also about temperature and salinity. Melting the Arctic ice cap might not raise sea levels, but it would dump a whole bunch of cold fresh water into (relatively) warmer, salt water. This could have drastic effects on marine life and on major currents, including the Gulf Stream.

China and India are adding up

[aspelling]

Guess what will happens if we add up HUGE (3.6 billion people) growing 10% a year economies of CHINA and INDIA. Offshore outsourcing and following knowledge transfer are the reasons for this exponential grows. Just imagine of the future impact of these economies when 3.6B people will start driving cars and use A/C. Don't forget that these nations don't really have environmental regulations.

Re:Capitalism & Population Growth

[KrackHouse]

Actually the population of the US hasn't been self sustaining for 30 years or so. We have immigrants that keep us growing. Japan has closed borders and they're having huges issues with an aging population.

Re:Best to Worst is large!

[mveloso]

This is the problem with science in the context of public policy, and why that statement about the Bush administration's science policy is a bit out of whack.

Almost by definition, anything that recommends a solution is bad science. Science isn't very good at outcomes, but that's what politicians need.

In the case of global warming, it's difficult because the costs are imposed now, and the outcome is always in doubt. If we do X, there's no guarantee that X will happen. So are you willing to spend hundreds of billions or trillions of dollars and affect every industry for possibly no gain? Nope.

Science doesn't determine goals, direction, and priorities - politicians (and the public) do. And that's how it should be. Scientists don't pay a price if they're wrong.

Oh, for fuck's sake...

[adamofgreyskull]

I just read the BBC article and they're talking about the floods a couple/few years back. The main cause of flooding in recent years has been down to heavy rainfall on already saturated ground. I really can't see why this has anything to do with Global Warming.

Here is a link about flooding in the Tonbridge region. The river Medway (which starts off as the Eden in my home-town) has been flooding for a long long time, as I learnt in Geography lessons :o) with the first recorded major flooding in the 1800s.

Can anyone who's read the report (slashdotted now) shed any light on why this is being attributed to GW?

Re:Oh, for fuck's sake...

[erik_norgaard]

You are reading global warming as if global warming is evenly distributed across the globe. This is the first blunder that always leads to the question - a few degrees, does it really matter? The global increase in average temperature does not even out accross the globe as the rise of sealevel due to melting of glacial ice.

Fact is that climate is complex, in some regions temperature will rise more than others. In some regions temperatures may even fall.

It is the differences in air and water temperature and air pressure - and the rotation of the earth - that keeps the climate systems running.

Changing these differences means that the climate systems may run faster or slower or in another direction locally.

This again means that some regions may get more rain and others less. Regions where it will rain more may due to the local geography suffer more floddings, others will become more fertile.

Changes in temperature can have many and various effects. Increased temperature in the arctic sea may slow down the hot water current from the carribian (golf stream), and eventually stop it. But the reason that northern Europe remains ice free is just because of that current. So stopping it may then trigger a new ice age.

Another, less rain may form deserts or increase the groth of existing desserts in the affected area. Increasing the dessert area will increase the albedo and reduce temperature.

More rain is normally associated with more clouds, clouds also increase the albedo, but clouds also functions as an insulating carpet. So which effect is stronger is difficult to say.

Melting ice means that less areas are covered by ice, this decreases the albedo. Hence the temperature will increase.

All these are examples of singled out events that has some effect on the system as a whole, all these positive and negative feedback processes are being compared against each other in a complex model.

What you are doing is taking one example, refer to some ocasion 200 years ago and say "See? There's no global warming causing flodding." This is so overly simplified.

Possibly, your area will experience less floddings, while whole countries dissappear into the sea due to increased sealevel.

Re:Global Warming?

[AKAImBatman]

Wow, I'm pro-nuclear power, but not like that :)

Ford was worse. At one point, they wanted to put a nuclear reactor into a car! :-)

Whats the energy density of rice?

Pathetic. About 15 MJ/kg. And it's pretty hard to come up with kilograms of rice or corn when compared to other fuels.

It always amazing me how little food we animals need to eat to continue functioning and moving around.

Well, your body is generating about 200 watts of constant power. That means that you need about .72 MJ per hour to operate. For cars, you tend to need a lot more horsepower. Here's the conversion:

1 Watt = 0.00134102209 horsepower

For a 150HP engine, you're talking about an energy drain of about 112 KW. That's 403 MJ of energy per hour. Realistically, cars only expend a lot of energy when accelerating. Thus an economy car tends to use more like 20 HP for cruising. That works out to a constant power requirement of about 15 KW. 15KW is 5.4 MJ per hour.

What massive battle between scientists?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't you mean the massive battle between the scientists and oil companies?

Only about 3 out of every 1000 scientists is an "environmental skeptic."

Do you also wonder about the massive battle between scientists about whether cigarettes cause cancer?