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Climate Change Rate To Turn Southern Spain To Desert By 2100, Report Warns (theguardian.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the reduced-to-ashes dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Southern Spain will be reduced to desert by the end of the century if the current rate of greenhouse gas emissions continue unchecked, researchers have warned. Anything less than extremely ambitious and politically unlikely carbon emissions cuts will see ecosystems in the Mediterranean change to a state unprecedented in the past 10 millennia, they said. The study, published in the journal Science, modeled what would happen to vegetation in the Mediterranean basin under four different paths of future carbon emissions, from a business-as-usual scenario at the worst end to keeping temperature rises below the Paris climate deal target of 1.5C at the other. Temperatures would rise nearly 5C globally under the worst case scenario by 2100, causing deserts to expand northwards across southern Spain and Sicily, and Mediterranean vegetation to replace deciduous forests. Even if emissions are held to the level of pledges put forward ahead of the Paris deal, southern Europe would experience a "substantial" expansion of deserts. The level of change would be beyond anything the region's ecosystems had experienced during the holocene, the geological epoch that started more than 10,000 years ago. The real impact on Mediterranean ecosystems, which are considered a hotspot of biodiversity, could be worse because the study did not look at other human impacts, such as forests being turned over to grow food. The researchers fed a model with 10,000 years of pollen records to build a picture of vegetation in the region, and used that to infer previous temperatures in the Mediterranean. They then ran the model to see what would happen to the vegetation in the future, using four different scenarios of warming, three of them taken from the UN's climate science panel, the IPCC. Only the most stringent cut in emissions -- which is roughly equivalent to meeting the Paris aspiration of holding warming to 1.5C -- would see ecosystems remain within the limits they experienced in the Holocene.

33 of 282 comments (clear)

  1. Not just Southern Spain by rrohbeck · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Much of the US too: http://web.archive.org/web/200...

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    1. Re:Not just Southern Spain by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      I've lived on Miami Beach for 30+ years. In the last 6 years or so, when there is heavy rain, the water comes up over the sidewalk and completely floods the streets - **every time**. This never used to happen, and now it's totally predictable. So yeah, shit is happening, and you can observe it yourself if you choose to.

    2. Re:Not just Southern Spain by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 3, Informative

      It's important to note that this is a worst-case scenario, which typically means its somewhat improbable. Of course, the worst-case scenario also just so happens to make the best headlines.

      I'm not arguing that the climate isn't changing, or that's it's not worthwhile to curb pollutants and emissions. But I fear this constant fear-mongering is damaging climate science credibility as much as it's helping to push forward good environmental policies. This is highly reminiscent of the now laughable doomsday predictions around the time of our first Earth Day in 1970. Among these:

      * Civilization Will End Within 15 Or 30 Years
      * 100-200 Million People Per Year Will Be Starving To Death During The Next Ten Years
      * Population Will Inevitably And Completely Outstrip Whatever Small Increases In Food Supplies We Make
      * Demographers Agree Almost Unanimously Thirty Years From Now, The Entire World Will Be In Famine
      * In A Decade, Urban Dwellers Will Have To Wear Gas Masks To Survive Air Pollution
      * Childbearing [Will Be] A Punishable Crime Against Society, Unless The Parents Hold A Government License
      * By The Year 2000 There Won’t Be Any More Crude Oil

      There's an interesting article on why most of these dire predictions didn't come to pass, noting some positive outcomes of the increased environmental awareness, like the Clean Water, Clean Air, Endangered Species acts, and other environmental protection laws.

      When the experts have been consistently wrong with these constant doomsday predictions for 45 years, is it any wonder that people start to become skeptical of ALL climate and environmental sciences? That's not a good thing.

      --
      Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
    3. Re:Not just Southern Spain by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 2

      That, and it seems like every time you read something written by people who are clinically depressed, they always talk about how people are getting poorer and poorer.

      https://ourworldindata.org/gra...

    4. Re:Not just Southern Spain by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I'd imagine many of those same people also still believe the world overpopulation doomsday predictions of the 70's, even though population is demonstrably trending toward peaking at around a very manageable 8.7 billion by 2055, according to recent analysis and predictions. I still encounter people (some here on slashdot) who are seriously worried about the world's population "problem", and pointing them at current trends and predictions seems to do nothing to dissuade them that it's really a non-issue.

      --
      Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
    5. Re:Not just Southern Spain by ishmaelflood · · Score: 3, Insightful

      and there are no other changes in that time, for instance, another million lazy overfed stupid people moved to Miami and overloaded the drainage system?

    6. Re:Not just Southern Spain by rrohbeck · · Score: 2

      Those four scenarios were the four IPCC RCPs. The "worst case" is RCP8.5. We're trending slightly above RCP8.5. The other three include "negative emissions technology" and/or emissions reductions so steep that they would collapse the world economy.

      --
      thegodmovie.com - watch it
    7. Re:Not just Southern Spain by Crashmarik · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Bingo. Every damn square inch of land is built up and overbuilt there. The areas still next to the beaches are fine.

    8. Re:Not just Southern Spain by locofungus · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It's important to note that this is a worst-case scenario
      No. The worst case scenario they considered is "Business as usual".

        which typically means its somewhat improbable

      Unfortunately not. It's the most likely scenario. The only positive note is that there doesn't appear to be a concerted effort to increase emissions so it's reasonably to reject scenarios with CO2e increasing faster than BaU (unless you think positive feedbacks for CO2 and CH4 emissions are starting to significantly kick in now)

      --
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    9. Re:Not just Southern Spain by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      I've inherited some farmland in southern Georgia that is about 16 feet above sea level. Not worth a whole lot. Would love for it to be ocean front property. I burn extra carbon every chance I get.

      Screw the rabbits, they can swim for it.

    10. Re:Not just Southern Spain by Bongo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Indeed. I once met an environmentalist who worked advising on carbon credits. I asked, what if CO2 isn't a real problem and meanwhile other pollutants are worse? The person replied, "it doesn't matter if CO2 isn't a problem, because by forcing a reduction in CO2, you're forcing a reduction in production, and a reduction in consumption," and then they added with emphasis, "it's about reducing greed."

      The whole climate change movement has unfortunately mixed together ethics and science. And used "science" as the "reason" to accept the ethics. You "MUST" cut CO2 and do it in the societal-changing ways we believe in.

      So I really am of the opinion that, by using science to push forward a particular ethics, they are damaging science's credibility as a source of OBJECTIVE truths.

      Ethics ARE indeed essential, and essential in a different domain: ethics are INTERSUBJECTIVE values. People get together and think about how they want to treat each other. It is subjective (you cannot "prove" that survival of the fittest is a better way to live than trying to help everyone be equal.) Ethical questions are things we reason out as a group, as a society, and so on. So it is inter-subjective whilst science focusses on objective truths.

      But the moment you wrap your particular ethical beliefs inside science hypothesis, models, and observations, then anyone who ends up disagreeing with that set of science hypotheses, models, and observations, ends up on the wrong side of the ETHICS, which is why "denialist" is used to mean that that person is NASTY horrible uncaring and funded by some evil interest group.

      I personally am all for a progressive humanity and humanism and more ethical living. It is morally ghastly that a human being born today might die in a war zone starving to death, or live a prosperous life, simply by accident of where they happened to be born on this rock. It is morally wrong also, that we don't seem to be able to organise around developing good abundant cleaner sources of energy (not windfarms, I said abundant) and instead are mired in decade-long politics and market crazy games. And, crucially, these are questions about ETHICS. They are not science.

      Kennedy even said in his Moon speech that technology has no ethics. We should be able to debate ETHICAL questions as a society and lay them clearly on the table as ETHICAL problems. We should not be trying to wrap ethical questions into "science" and claim the science theory happens to DEMAND the particular ethical view which you or some interest group holds. This whole "we HAVE to act" mantra and that you're a "denialist" if you happen to question their view, is absolute rubbish. And it is damaging the public's view of science.

      Separate ethics from science, and allow each to do their own job, by their own methods.

    11. Re:Not just Southern Spain by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It's a non-issue inasmuch as we're easily able to feed all the people on this planet, which was the expected result of a global population explosion. Hunger is primarily caused by politics and corruption these days, not a lack of food - it's essentially a distribution issue. Poverty is a different issue that needs addressing, but isn't intrinsically related to or caused by dense populations.

      In other words, it doesn't make you a humanitarian to wring your hands and berate others about issues that have no real consequence. It just makes you an ignorant, self-righteous fool.

      --
      Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
    12. Re: Not just Southern Spain by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Look at what happened to the Aral Sea under the Soviets. The sea doesn't really exist anymore! (except as two small pocket remnants)

      Sure, we can also look at the horrible pollution in China, or environmental disasters right here at home (thankfully rarer these days). I'm not saying that there aren't real issues. But I think some caution must be employed with proclaiming potential worst-case doomsday scenarios as an expected result. The more often scientists or experts predict the end of the world and it doesn't come to pass, the more people will stop trusting science in the first place, and that seems like a very bad thing to me.

      In fact, I think we're already starting to witness this phenomenon, as many, many people believe global warming is a complete hoax. It's a little hard to dissuade them when they can see for themselves that dire predictions made just a decade or two ago have been laughably overstated. Why believe the current predictions then? If earlier predictions had been even slightly more accurate, they'd have no justification in doubting the current science. Trust is earned, and climatologists have done a terrible job at earning that trust with effective predictions so far.

      --
      Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
    13. Re:Not just Southern Spain by Mr+D+from+63 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The 'scenario' is based on a simple yet unproven assumption that a warmer globe means a drier climate in specific localized regions. Yet there is no proof of this or a validated model for this. With our inability to understand the feedback mechanisms in a warmer world that we've not yet witnessed, we might find that precipitation actually increases in some of these regions.

      We can be serious about addressing CO2 issues without assuming everything must get worse everywhere as a result. I call general bullshit on the predictions that always say dry areas get dryer, wet areas get wetter, stormy regions get stormier. Its too simple an assumption in a complex system.

    14. Re:Not just Southern Spain by drinkypoo · · Score: 2

      The 'scenario' is based on a simple yet unproven assumption that a warmer globe means a drier climate in specific localized regions. Yet there is no proof of this or a validated model for this.

      We know what weather patterns form deserts, and what produces those weather patterns. Are you saying that we can't take a good guess at what will happen if we simply pour more energy into the existing weather patterns? I suspect that's something we're fairly good at.

      With our inability to understand the feedback mechanisms in a warmer world that we've not yet witnessed, we might find that precipitation actually increases in some of these regions.

      Yes, we might. But probably not. We've already had the opportunity to observe significant global warming, so our ability to make declarative statements about it is improving over time, and you're pretending that it itsn't.

      I call general bullshit on the predictions that always say dry areas get dryer, wet areas get wetter, stormy regions get stormier. Its too simple an assumption in a complex system.

      That's not the prediction. This is a prediction about one specific dry area. You know what's more suspicious than a prediction that a dry area will get dryer? Refusing to accept such a plausible prediction. They're making a quite believable claim (adding energy to a system will increase its extremes) and you are making the exceptional counterclaim. It is you with the responsibility of providing exceptional evidence.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    15. Re:Not just Southern Spain by drinkypoo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It's pretty logical why people over history want to believe the world/society/civilization is ending - it makes a superb excuse for extremely localized personal choices and values.

      Societies and civilizations always end. That's what they do.

      Nobody said the world is ending. The claim is that it's about to get extremely inconvenient for humans.

      It's pretty logical why people move the goalposts — so they don't have to actually do anything to change.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    16. Re:Not just Southern Spain by Mr+D+from+63 · · Score: 2

      We know what weather patterns form deserts, and what produces those weather patterns. Are you saying that we can't take a good guess at what will happen if we simply pour more energy into the existing weather patterns? I suspect that's something we're fairly good at.

      I am saying we can't predict what those weather patterns will be after a large shift in global temperatures. I don't know why you would suspect we are good at it, we can't predict rainfall or drought seasonally. There is no validated model that shows we can. You can assume we can, that's fine if you like.

      Yes, we might. But probably not. We've already had the opportunity to observe significant global warming, so our ability to make declarative statements about it is improving over time, and you're pretending that it itsn't.

      I never said we won't have warming over time. You must have read something I didn't say.

      That's not the prediction. This is a prediction about one specific dry area. You know what's more suspicious than a prediction that a dry area will get dryer? Refusing to accept such a plausible prediction. They're making a quite believable claim (adding energy to a system will increase its extremes) and you are making the exceptional counterclaim. It is you with the responsibility of providing exceptional evidence.

      I understand the prediction is one specific area. That is my point, We don't have that ability. I didn't refuse to accept it. I said we don't have any certainty or validation against a larger global warming shift. Your insistence that it must be correct is more telling. I don't insist it is wrong, I am just saying we don't have any certainly in these models. Obviously I can't present evidence that the models have uncertainty, as you can present evidence they are correct. I can say with certainty that the climate locally is part of a very complex model, and we've not shown any ability to accurately reflect that model in the short term, so there is little reason to believe it is accurate it the long term. But you can go ahead an just insist that it must be accurate if you like. I maintain a more critical view.

    17. Re:Not just Southern Spain by PopeRatzo · · Score: 2

      Nobody said the world is ending. The claim is that it's about to get extremely inconvenient for humans.

      Stop making sense. This is a Slashdot global warming thread. We're all supposed to say science is full of shit.

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      You are welcome on my lawn.
    18. Re:Not just Southern Spain by Ol+Olsoc · · Score: 2

      I've lived on Miami Beach for 30+ years. In the last 6 years or so, when there is heavy rain, the water comes up over the sidewalk and completely floods the streets - **every time**. This never used to happen, and now it's totally predictable. So yeah, shit is happening, and you can observe it yourself if you choose to.

      Oh boy - there's some dingdong I've had a row with who is gonna be pissed at you! He claims that there is absolutely no water rise issues in Miami, all is well, and all of the data claiming water rise is a conspiracy, all of the reports are a conspiracy, and there is no such thing as sea level rise.

      --
      The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
  2. Re:Stick to tech news please by jenningsthecat · · Score: 2

    Since tech is at the root of a lot of global warming, and tech will likely figure prominently in any solutions we might come up with, and there's already a pretty big tech sector devoted to reducing greenhouse gas emissions - this IS a tech story, fucktard. Get your head out of your ass, and your ass out of Mom's basement.

    --
    'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
  3. The rain in Spain... by TWX · · Score: 2, Funny

    The Rain in Spain stays mainly out-of-the Plain...

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  4. Big deal by rsilvergun · · Score: 2, Funny

    In billions of years the sun is going to encompass the Earth, right? Global warming is in our future.

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  5. Souther Spain was ALREADY a desert in the 80s by elcor · · Score: 2

    Doubt it got greener since then.

    1. Re:Souther Spain was ALREADY a desert in the 80s by CQDX · · Score: 4, Informative

      Quite a few Spaghetti Westerns were filmed there because it looks like the desert southwest region of the USA.

  6. Re:Not just Southern Spain DGW - Dinosaurs WARMED! by R3d+M3rcury · · Score: 2

    Look, who wants 26% atmospheric oxygen? More air to breathe? Who wants that?

    I dunno. You also get worse wildfires. Add that to the drought and there could be even bigger trouble.

  7. look at satellite images. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    Southern spain is desert by most peoples definitions already.
    every place where people are not actively agriculturing has been desolated by farming already.. like a fucking 1000 years ago by now?

    basically, this leads to believe that they haven't actually been to spain. or even looked at google maps. just compare italy to spain. hell, if you looked at pictures of spanish civil war prior to WW2(!!!!) it's already like that.

    https://www.google.co.th/maps/place/Spain/@39.8596584,-12.7036393,2880738m/data=!3m2!1e3!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0xc42e3783261bc8b:0xa6ec2c940768a3ec!8m2!3d40.463667!4d-3.74922

    it's not desert only in places that have human agriculture, so fuck this study - give a better one.

  8. Re:Not just Southern Spain DGW - Dinosaurs WARMED! by Stephan+Schulz · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The Jurassic period. [...]

    How often do you repeat this canned nonsense and where did you get it? It've rebutted a previous incarnation here. Of course, it's not atypical for creationists and similar groups to keep repeating refuted arguments over and over again - it is, of course, much easier than to come up with real arguments. And chances are your audience does not know enough to understand the state of the art and the quality (or lack of same) of the argument. So while intellectually dishonest, it may be an economically efficient strategy if you are interested in propaganda more than in understanding...

    --

    Stephan

  9. Re:Not just Southern Spain DGW - Dinosaurs WARMED! by erikkemperman · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Why bother? It's all futile.

    Marvin? Is that you?

    --
    Gosh, thanks. That must be why the other ships call me Meatfucker -- GCU Grey Area (Eccentric)
  10. Re:climate models by TapeCutter · · Score: 3, Informative

    whatever causes that

    Google "Hadley Cells", they are basically convection currents, tropical storms create huge updrafts which reach the stratosphere and are pushed polewards from the equator by the rotation of the planet. At that altitude the air becomes cold and dry, the cold, dry air falls back to earth and forms the bands of deserts that circle the earth on each side of the equator. As the planet heats up the convection currents become stronger, making monsoons wetter and the desert bands wider.

    --
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  11. What happned to the Aral Sea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    That happened because the Syr Daria was diverted for irrigation, removing the Aral Sea's primary water source. It had nothing to do with climate change. It had everything to do with the socialism you espouse.

  12. Re:Not just Southern Spain DGW - Dinosaurs WARMED! by Stephan+Schulz · · Score: 2

    First off. I wrote it. I figured that I should "improve it" to refute your supposed refutations.

    Well, as far as I can tell, so far you haven't - you just repeat it. But I'd suggest you first try to figure out how valid (or invalid) your point is before you work on the details.

    But you fucking people are god damned worthless anyways. You never offer solutions to your AGW. If you have no solutions and the solution is to remove mankind, [...rest of the rant deleted]

    The scientific truth of a statement has nothing to do with the question of an adequate way to handle the problem identified in the statement. I'd love to have Star-Trek-like superluminal travel, but that wish has nothing to do with the validity of the theory of relativity.

    I happen to think that it is better to know and understand a problem even if we don't yet have a perfect solution to it - indeed, I find that usually that is a necessary precondition for addressing the problem. And even if we never come up with an acceptable way to at least partially control global warming (I think there are plenty, and the side benefits alone probably outweigh the associated costs), I still would want to understand the mechanisms that cause it. Indeed, if ever they drag me to my execution, I'd still like to know how the guillotine works. Hi, my name is Stephan and I'm a scientist.

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    Stephan

  13. Re:Not just Southern Spain DGW - Dinosaurs WARMED! by Immerman · · Score: 2

    No, most of them went completely extinct - only one small branch evolved into birds. And reptiles had already split off long before - lizards (and proto-mammals) walked the earth before dinosaurs existed.

    I mean hey, primates rule the planet now, but its okay if a mass extinction wipes us all out, so long as some squirrel monkeys somewhere manage to survive the catastrophe, right?

    --
    --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
  14. Re:Not just Southern Spain DGW - Dinosaurs WARMED! by NoNonAlphaCharsHere · · Score: 2

    Well done. I absolutely cannot tell if you're trolling or dead serious.