In Progress: Fastest Sea Rise In At Least 2800 Years (www.cbc.ca)

Layzej writes: A new study finds that sea levels on Earth are rising several times faster than they have in the past 2,800 years and are accelerating. Co-author Stefan Rahmstorf explains that the fact that the rise in the 20th century is so large is a logical physical consequence of man-made global warming. This is melting continental ice and thus adds extra water to the oceans. In addition, as the sea water warms up it expands. The data from the past can also be used for future projections, using a so-called semi-empirical model calibrated with the historically observed relationship between temperature and sea level. With the new data, this results in a projected increase in the 21st century of 24-131 cm, depending on our emissions and thus on the extent of global warming.

Comments

Non-believers

[danbert8]

All those people buying and living in coastal houses don't seem to believe in climate change I guess. The ocean is rising, yet prices remain sky high for anything near the coast...

Re:Non-believers

[unimacs]

The insurance companies who've been raising premiums in coastal areas sure do.

Re:Non-believers

[MightyMartian]

The actuary tables don't lie. Insurance companies have accepted AGW for years now, no matter how much Big Oil and the Koch's try to deny it.

Re:Non-believers

[unimacs]

But it's the free market right? If all these insurance are over charging wouldn't other companies swoop in with lower premiums and steel all the business? Why don't they? Because they're genuinely afraid of they big payouts they'll increasingly have to make.

Re:Non-believers

[gstoddart]

When the responses are on the order of "how do we know the vase is broken?" or "prove the vase wouldn't have broken on its own" ... there are people who are trying to say "there is no mess, and even if there was a mess you can't prove it was us".

You don't think those companies paying to fund stuff which says "nope, not happening" want to muddy the waters long enough to keep up profits for a while?

I mean, when Exxon scientists identified climate change decades ago, and when Exxon spent huge amounts of money denying climate change, you can bet your ass that the denial of this comes entirely from corporate interests who don't want the source of their profits impacted, and they don't really give a crap how it affects everyone else.

Corporations are, collectively, sociopaths. The longer they can convince you either there is no mess or that they nothing to do with it, the longer they can keep making huge sums of money.

The people denying it's happening have a vested interest in misdirection and deception for as long as they can. Nobody has any other reason to deny it's happening other than the money they're going to make.

This is the standard bullshit of the PR game ... keep publicly lying about it to confuse the issue, and pay to discredit the facts to support their own narrative. Complete and utter sociopaths with no regard for anything but themselves.

Re:Non-believers

[Ol Olsoc]

The actuary tables don't lie. Insurance companies have accepted AGW for years now, no matter how much Big Oil and the Koch's try to deny it.

Around 10 years ago, I sat in on a presentation by an insurance company exec who made an incredibly compelling case for the monetary cost of the global warming. Complete with facts and figures. Oddly enough, I haven't heard a lot of deniers cherry picking those numbers.

Re:Non-believers

[phantomfive]

The actuary tables don't lie

Asking an insurance company if something might increase risk is like asking a tobacco company if cigarettes prevent cancer. Huge monetary incentive there.

Re:Non-believers

[turkeyfish]

The interesting aspect of this is that so far buyers don't seem to recognize that what each successive buyer will be both accepting more risk, hence paying more and more for insurance, on a property that will be worth less when it comes time to sell. Coastal property is very much now like milk and other perishable items. It has a sell by date stamped on it. Its just that the dates are of relatively longer duration, on the order of a few generations.

Given human nature, this musical chairs nature of the coastal property business won't make itself evident to most for another 25-50 years or so. By then with higher temperatures and hence more energy and moisture in the air and consequently more violent and more frequent storms this risks will be apparent to most. However, given that the wealthy are the primary buyers of coastal real estate, form them it's more a question of disposable income. Also for them, it is likely that much if not nearly all of these costs will be passed on to taxpayers and consumers generally, as the buy politicians to shift the tax burden from the wealthy onto the poor and the dwindling middle class and they simply pass the costs on in the form of higher prices in the businesses that they own and control.

The biggest impact will be in cities like Miami and parts of New Jersey, and large stretches of the Eastern Seaboard and Gulf of Mexico, where the elevations are so uniformly low over considerable expanses. There all properties will be effected and both rich and poor will be forced to migrate elsewhere. The rich should be ok as they may already have property elsewhere or resources that they can use to purchase other properties even as their seaside properties become worthless. The poor on the other hand will be forced to face conditions similar to those now faced by indigents in Bangladesh, too poor to stay and too poor to move. This will probably be the big unexpected aspect of sea level rise, the political and economic instability that it creates by making so many to lose it all, with little political or economic recourse. Subsequent generations will suffer disproportionately on the individual level as families that might once have had property that could be passed onto subsequent generations in the form of inheritance will be left with greatly diminished inheritance.

What few recognize is that given free energy considerations and the consequent fact that once a carbon dioxide molecule is generated from fossil fuels, it stays essentially as a permanent fixture in the atmosphere for on average about 100 years. Given the fact that it thus accumulates, the process is exponential, but the consequences time-lagged so that we have yet to experience the effect of carbon dioxide put into the atmosphere over the past 50 years, an amount far greater than the previous 50. If one extrapolates from previous geological periods and looks at rates of sea-level rise at various locations, one sees spurts of rising over very short time periods, several meter rises over a hundred year period in some cases (remember that 5+ inches/100 year is a global average). Consequently, there is far more "coastal property" than most people recognize.

Unfortunately for those on in the US living on the Western Atlantic, the effects of Greenland ice melt on sea level rise will be greatest there rather than immediately adjacent to Greenland because of the fact that the oceans are in motion and the differential between isostatic adjustment and water mass position forces the maximum peaks southward, but primarily over the Western rather than Eastern Atlantic Ocean. Consequently, those rising tides will be flooding Wall Street within the next few hundred years with near certainty. That's a lot of expensive real estate that will need to be liquidated (in more ways than one) in a relatively short period of time.

Re:Non-believers

[turkeyfish]

Having experienced Katrina I can assure you that insurance companies will simply ignore the law with relative impunity. Remember, it's a lot cheaper to simply buy yourself a few politicians, prosecutors, judges, and regulators than actually pay out massive claims during a major storm event.

Re:Non-believers

[turkeyfish]

Yes exactly. You're analogy is kind of like the American voter who consistently votes for candidates who don't believe in government and then complain when the government doesn't work. Yes, a lot like putting your head into the cog of a giant machine and having it crushed. Admittedly, one does hear the screams of anguish.

Too bad that as the heads explode, they fail to recognize that the guy they were counting on to turn the crushing machine off, was really busy speeding it up to benefit the guy who owns the crushing machine and is eager to profit by selling more crushing machines.

Ironic that with all that freedom, so many choose to use it to be stupid.

Re:Non-believers

[turkeyfish]

Electric cars, ships, and planes, and manufacturing plants powered completely by the wind and the sun are probably the most urgently needed commodity.

The tragedy is that given the exponential nature of the global warming problem, if we don't see a major shift to such commodities in the next 25-50 years, there will be nothing that humans can do to stop the increased warming that will occur after that, even if we never burn fossil fuels afterwards, because several large positive feedback mechanisms not included in current climate models will come to dominate the global climate system.

These positive feedbacks include Arctic amplification due to dramatic increase in albedo of the Arctic, release of huge stores of carbon trapped in permafrost, release of huge stores of carbon trapped in methane clathrates, and release of carbon from peat bogs and rainforests as soils dessicate and decomposition dominates carbon fixation from photosynthesis. These sources are so large that they dwarf what humans could do to lower carbon dioxide levels. Of course, the effects on total carbon dioxide will be additive in any event.

Few notice, but the trend in oceanic environments are not good, as the sea warm more and more phytoplankton and zooplankton move northward to physiologically optimal zones leaving behind the equivalent of photosynthetic deserts. Tropical marine ecosystems are now collapsing everywhere on the planet as the Earth shifts toward a new oceanic/atmospheric thermal equilibrium.

Re: Non-believers

[Ol Olsoc]

I love discussing things with shallow. He can invalidate an entire scientific issue with one sentence.

When something is so painfully wrong that it can be defeated with one sentence, then why use two?

A wise man once told me, any idea that can be dealt with in a nutshell, belongs in one.

As well, your circular arguments are not convincing anyone but yourself.

Re:Non-believers

[khallow]

In Tracy Kidder's book House, he interviews a carpenter who talks about stairs. The carpenter claims that if you were to play a slow motion film of people walking up stairs you'd see that the soles of their feet clear the top of each stair tread by a couple of millimeters. They take the first step and then instinctively lift each foot by no more than they absolutely have to clear each step. That's why it's critically important to get the height of the first step right; if it's just a little bit off the stairway will forever after be tripping people up, but they won't know why because the difference is imperceptible.

I heard this before, It's bullshit. There are plenty of examples of stairs which are grossly uneven and off by far more than a couple of millimeters and people don't have trouble climbing them. Classic examples are outdoor stairs which go up hills and mountains (like Mount Fuji in Japan).

There's something like that when it comes to buying land in a floodplain. The past performance of flood control structures is like that first step on the stairway; it sets peoples' expectations to future performance. But those structures introduce a discontinuity into a gradually increasing water level. The water may have come within an inch of the seawall top a half dozen times in the last year, but an inch is as good as a mile. But if the sea level rises an inch, well that doesn't sound like much but a lot of people will notice.

A floodplain is a river feature. A seawall is an ocean-based structure. You're thinking of a levee which is the corresponding river-based structure to a seawall.

And for a well built seawall, overlapping the wall is not all or nothing. The seawall still reduces flooding and the damaging effects of wave action on whatever is behind the wall even when the wall is overlapped.

Re:The situation is indeed dire

[gstoddart]

You do realise the universe doesn't give a flying fuck about what you think about Climate scientists.

Pretty much this. And, moreover, the universe doesn't give a crap about our continued existence, and won't take any special steps to save us.

The problem is we're an exceedingly short-sighted species, and the near term profits of corporations are pretty much driving this process, and they'd rather have big executive bonuses now than give a fuck if there's a habitable planet down the road.

I figure the only people actively denying climate change stand to make money from the status quo. Pretending it's not happening pretty much has no rational basis in anything else, because it doesn't otherwise benefit anybody.

and 4000 years ago

[rubycodez]

it was rising faster than it is now. It was those middle eastern goat herders and their SUVs!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Science Denial on Slashdot...

[tekrat]

What's funny is that this is *Slashdot* -- where I actually come here for the comments, usually because Slashdot is inhabited by geeks, techs, programmers, scientists; i.e; People that should know a thing or two. Usually the discourse here is insightful and thought-provoking...

And then comes a global warming post, and all the science deniers come out of the woodwork. You see posts as dumb as "It's snowing right now out my window -- global warming is a myth!"

This is directed to all the deniers -- what are you people *doing* here on Slashdot? Do you actually work in the technology field and yet deny actual science?

We *KNOW* there's too much CO2 in the atmosphere and we KNOW that it traps heat, so, what precisely are you denying?

Or has Fox News tainted your perception of the world so thoroughly that when something comes up that clashes with your ideology you stick your fingers in your ears and scream "LALALALAL I can't HEAR you!" when presented with FACTS?

Seriously, I don't understand why someone who denies science is on Slashdot -- why not also talk about how Black Holes are a myth, why we can't go beyond a 4Ghz CPU speed because God says so, and solving complex math is forbidden by the Bible? Maybe you'd prefer Slashdot articles on Ghosts, Chemtrails, UFOs and Bigfoot?

Re:Science Denial on Slashdot...

[Anonymous Coward]

And then comes a global warming post, and all the science deniers come out of the woodwork. You see posts as dumb as "It's snowing right now out my window -- global warming is a myth!"

First off, labeling anyone that disagrees with you as a "science denier" is neither insightful nor thought provoking so you might remove the plank from your eye before criticizing the specks in others. Second, the posts you describe as "dumb" are generally a sarcastic shot at those that carried on about how Katrina was the new norm or every other weather event that was some kind of proof of AGW. It's a sarcastic point so it may not translate well into online fora but if you've been around here much you know it's rather common.

This is directed to all the deniers -- what are you people *doing* here on Slashdot? Do you actually work in the technology field and yet deny actual science?

We *KNOW* there's too much CO2 in the atmosphere and we KNOW that it traps heat, so, what precisely are you denying?

I have degrees in chemistry and computer engineering. I work the technology field and consult with many companies and government agencies that revolve around environmental issues. If you want to whip it out and compare, I'm sure I'll stack up.

We do not *KNOW* there's too much CO2 in the atmosphere. We are, at this moment in planetary history, at all time lows for atmospheric CO2. Historically we should be around the average of about 1600-1800ppm. Around 280ppm we would see plant life began to die off. We are damn lucky to be rebounding now. Yes, CO2 traps heat. We rarely hear about the way it does that is a logarithmic effect. The impact of going from 500 to 600 ppm is far lass than the effect of going from 300 to 400.

Or has Fox News tainted your perception of the world so thoroughly that when something comes up that clashes with your ideology you stick your fingers in your ears and scream "LALALALAL I can't HEAR you!" when presented with FACTS?

Seriously, I don't understand why someone who denies science is on Slashdot -- why not also talk about how Black Holes are a myth, why we can't go beyond a 4Ghz CPU speed because God says so, and solving complex math is forbidden by the Bible? Maybe you'd prefer Slashdot articles on Ghosts, Chemtrails, UFOs and Bigfoot?

This screed here is a prime example of why these conversations are not about science but about intimidation and shutting down debate. You are the reason I post this AC. What you are doing is not even remotely science.

Re:Science Denial on Slashdot...

[Mike Van Pelt]

Personally, I have been advocating phasing out coal in favor of nuclear for over 40 years. The vast majority of people who claim to be oh so very very concerned about CO2, on the other hand, have been among those obstructing nuclear for over 40 years. Warming is their chickens coming home to roost. Unfortunately, those chickens are crapping all over those of us who do not deny arithmetic, too.

"I am not so much pro-nuclear as I am pro-arithmetic." -- Stuart Brand

Fair deal

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

The past century also saw unprecedented increases in general health, wealth, and longevity, amount of calories per person, and per dollar.

More than a fair trade. What went before was no friend of humanity, and any significant effort to trash what brought us these unprecedented benefits should be very carefully thought out.

The difference between, say, North and South Korea shows government's effect can be magnitudes worse than rising seas over 300 years (where we can less predict tech in 100 years than 1900 could today's.)