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Gulf Stream Slowdown in Progress?
peacefinder writes "Researchers report that one process which drives the Gulf Stream is slowing down. As that current is part of the global oceanic heat conveyor which keeps parts of Europe and North America warmer than would be expected for their latitudes, such a slowdown might lead to abrupt climate change."
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0319262/
A chilling account.
As it were.
It would be interesting to see the history of the gulf stream. Could it be a fluke of recent development?
At no point in earth's history has climate stood still. At no point in earth's history has all life been wiped clean from it. The earth is fine; if people go the way of the dinosaur, then so be it.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0268380/
;-)
is more appropriate...
Paul B.
I ruled at that game, so I'm fine, right?
Better watch out for negative hurricanes that instantly freeze people solid.
...to move to California.
Now all I have to worry about is the ground shaking and opening up, me falling in to the resulting hole, then being covered by a mudslide with a bushfire on top.
Oh, and maybe bears and mountain lions feasting on my protruding limbs as I flail for help.
But at least I'll be warm.
-EvilMagnus
A TV program a while back highlighted research investigating just why huge indigenous populations of Central America mysteriously disappeared around 800.
Lakebed sediment cores suggested a fairly severe multi-year drought around that time that was linked (through that Atlantic conveyor) to some severe winters in northern Europe. That drought was thought to disrupt agriculture that those cultures relied upon.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
Free PowerMacs
Water flowing
More water flowing
Even more water flowing
Water still flowing
Water flowing
Water flowing
Still interesting?
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
It's global warming .. er, I mean, cooling!
Here on the Canadian West Coast global warming has been great. Winters are getting milder and milder and we've have had some great summers in the last few years.
The only downsides have been a few pesky forest fires, and annual water restrictions.
As usual, this will only become an issue once the majority of people make the connection between climate change, its origins, and the resulting unpleasantness. (Starvation, war for dwindling resources, mad max, etc.)
Yes, it will be sad if Europe reverts to the temperature range of Canada or Russia. (French Ice Wine, anyone?) On the other hand, NJ and much of the east coast is also warmer than it should be due to the Gulf Stream.
No more people moving from NY/VT/NH to Florida, etc., for the climate and ruining our tax base!
the more accurate the calculations became, the more the concepts tended to vanish into thin air. R. S. Mulliken
Of course the party line is "Stop polluting".
.. then it's leadership by example. But .. where do they get the power for said electric cars? Coal burning power plants. So is it really LESS pollution to drive an electric car than an oil powered one?
.. and the environmentalist commies .. wont allow it TO give.
Riiight.
When %Politician% from %party% starts driving electric cars to political rallies
No.
So what? Build huge wind farms? Sorry, the environmentalist commies say it's too hard on the local birds, who fly into the blades and splatter.
Nuclear? Even with all the safety advances, the environmentalist commies rally and attack and block and sing kumbahyah (sp) in front of the bulldozers...
Oil? Heck no! Save our forests (from the same environmentalist commies).
Wait! I got it. Hydrogen power.
Duuh, where you do think they're getting the hydrogen. Passing large amounts of power through water. They get Oxygen, too, but where does the power come from? Coal! Right.
Oh, you say electrolysis. How do they heat the metals. Coal. Bingo.
The answer here is there IS no answer. Joe Fatass Public isn't going to stop driving his SUV cuz it's gunna get cold next century.
Something's gotta give
Mod me down, whatever...
= Grow a brain...
From the first link:
"The thermohaline circulation is a global ocean circulation. It is driven by differences in the density of the sea water which is controlled by temperature (thermal) and salinity (haline). In the North Atlantic it transports warm and salty water to the North."
Since the Argo project measures these attributes along with current direction and possibly speed, it is the perfect way to either confirm or disconfirm this finding. If Dr. Wadhams is correct, in his prediction that the poler ice caps will melt by 2020 the earliest, then we can be in for a very wild ride as the climate changes.
Briefish synopsis:
Recent measurements show that one of the three mechanisms believed to drive the Gulf Stream is decreasing more than expected. The result could be that the Gulf Stream turns off, meaning that warm currents from the equator are no longer brought to Northern Europe and North East America. This may happen in a decade, which might decrease our temperature by 5-8 degrees. Or it might happen over the next couple of centuries, which might actually be beneficial because it could counteract global warming. Or it might not happen at all, since no-one can actually predict this stuff.
Seems to me that we'd be better off not worrying about it. And no, I'm not a denier of global warming, I don't drive a SUV. Actually, I model fluid flow for a living, albeit on much smaller scales than oceanographic, and the kind of uncertainty involved in this almost makes it non-science. There are much more important issues than this to get worked up about - for example watch the videos on this site, and then try to tell me you care more about the Gulf Stream. Note that I think it's great this research is ongoing, but until they actually have something to report, the media should look into things that we actually know about, such as [insert your favourite here].
As unlikely as that might sound to most of you, that is exactly what the graphs show happening if everything keeps moving in the direction that it is moving today...
The reason that it can be true that 1+1 > 2 is that very peculiar nonzero value of the + operator
The fundamental philosophy of the most vocal group of "environmentalists" is that I should treat the planet (or something) as being more important than human life.
And you're expressing the fundamental philosophy of the most vocal corporate public relations departments -- that human life is somehow separate and independent of the global environment. We can't thrive without a healthy environment. We can't exist without a reasonably functional environment.
- Hail to our fearless misleader! Fool speed ahead!
But if we pump enough greenhouse gases into the atmosphere to overcome the counter-pressure built up in the poles... It could become a runaway greenhouse effect, which I believe were the words I used. In that scenario, our weather will head for a new equilibrium much like that of Venus.
By the way, a runaway greenhouse effect does not have to occur quickly. it could happen over thousands of years (or more). The telling sign will be if the earth is absorbing more energy than it is radiating back to space. If we have a sustained condition such as that, the earth is heating up and will continue to until it reaches a new balance (radiation in = radiation out).
FYI: There was recently an article on slashdot about this very condition being analyzed from space. It appears that we are there now, but we could have a few thousand years to fix the problem before our oceans are gone. If you think it is silly to talk about our oceans boiling away, please consider that water->steam is just another phase transition like ice->water, just a little further down the same road we are currently traveling.
The reason that it can be true that 1+1 > 2 is that very peculiar nonzero value of the + operator
They must be teaching only one method of hydrogen production in schools these days, that of "electrolysis". Strangely enough, this method seems to be the only method the public "knows" about to produce hydrogen. In fact, it is so "known", that one time I went to an alternative energy show here in Phoenix, and some representatives of "hydrogen technology" were showing that cute model (which one can buy Fry's Electronics and other places) which take a solar cell which generates electricity, electrolyses water, the H2 and O go into a PEM stack and out come power to turn a small moter/fan.
This is wrong...
The only kind of "commercial" hydrogen you will see generated this way is at a few test "fill up" stations in Europe (IIRC - or maybe Canada), and also "Brown's Gas" generators for industrial Hydro/Oxy welding and similar processes. Why don't you see it more?
Because it is a very inefficient manner of generating hydrogen!
Only in those instances (like industrial welding) where you can't easily store the cryo liquid form of the gases on site, and you need to use such a system on-demand, does it make sense to generate it in this manner. Those filling stations in Europe (or whereever)? A gimmick to placate a public which doesn't know any better. Anyone with half a brain can see that such generation of hydrogen is not a 100% conversion system of the power from the electricity to the hydrogen - powerline losses alone sink that idea, not to mention the fact that electrolysis is horribly inefficient. So where do we get most of our hydrogen?
Mainly from two sources - natural gas deposits and hydrocarbon cracking at refineries. When a natural gas well is "pumped" (well, it mostly isn't, because it is naturally under pressure, at least at the beginning), the first stuff to come out is generally hydrogen, then helium (which is REALLY running out fast), then the other gasses. These wells account for the majority of hydrogen.
Hydrocarbon cracking involves a process in which hydrocarbons are cracked via a superheated steam method at a refinery. It is a much more efficient method of getting hydrogen, but itself relies on hydrocarbon feedstocks, thus "fossil fuels". Though not used in industry anymore, it is also possible to crack water into H2 and O using superheated steam passed over red-hot iron. The conversion essentially creates a very big amount of rust (basically binding the oxygen to the iron), and isn't a practical method today, as it requires a lot of energy input into the system.
These last two methods would likely be better worked if coupled with solar furnaces or a nuclear heating system - indeed, even electrolysis becomes viable if a large enough source of electricity could be found that the losses are negligible to the entire output. Nuclear power is the answer here, but even it has a limited run in the long view.
The truth is, unless we develop some fantastic technology to do some real undersea exploration for fossil fuels (not likely), or we rape our coastlines via off-shore drilling (which leak - it is inevitable) - we are going to peak on all of our fuel sources at some point in the future (even coal, though it has a much longer future than the rest - but I wouldn't want to live in that hell - imagine 1800's Britain at the height of the industrial revolution, and all the ugly air - worldwide).
In a sane world, we would already be working to get off this planet and expand outward, while we still had the resources to acheive this and find other resources out on the other planets, moons, and asteroids. Somehow, though, I don't think this idea is going to bear fruit until it is much too late - we then become Easter Islanders...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
A disaster in Europe, or elsewhere in the world, has economic reprocussions everywhere else.
The flip-side to buffering trading partners from disaster (mutually beneficial) is being desimated by enormous disasters they encounter.
International trade has never been greater.
A deep freeze in Europe would probably throw the whole world into a depression, not to mention send luddites panicking in the streets.
We're all in this together, unfortunately. When a significant part of the globe gets fucked up, the economic wheels that make American SUVs will stop.
Oil,coal,hydrogen and nuclear are all out.... So here is the solution, PEOPLE!!
Take the third world population and have them run in People Wheels(tm) just like hamster wheels, to generate electricity! After they have run themselves to death we can recycle them as feed for the next generation of people wheels.....
Yes, its sarcasm, get over it.
Service guarantees Citizenship! Questions Guarantee GITMO.... Amerika Uber Alles!
I was trying to be funny. But even I don't think it was funny enough to get modded to 5.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
Erm. I think you are both wrong.
First, the "ice age" connection is not due to the energy it takes to melt ice. Rather it is due to the very topic of grandparent article. Namely the theory is that in the past the gulf stream shutdown (which is due to the fact that melted ice is less dense than salt water) led to a cooling of the European land mass, leading to extension of glaciers down from the north pole, leading to a higher albedo Earth, leading to cooling of the whole planet.
However, this time around we have higher GHG concentrations than in previous cycles and high projected global mean temperatures, so it seems unlikely that Europe will cool to the point where increased snowcover will lead to an ice age, even in the case of complete gulf stream collapse.
But I don't think that any respectable climatologist talks about runaway greenhouse effects with the Earth anymore. While there may be significant positive feedbacks in the climate system, there is no evidence that they are that large. As a climate scientist myself, I believe that we do need to reduce our GHG emissions as much as is feasible in order to avoid all sorts of unfortunate climate changes, but boiling the earth's oceans just isn't in the cards.