"Bones, perhaps we should acquaint the environmentalists
with the Heisenberg Clause of the Prime Directive."
Posted on 05/17/2002 8:45:25 AM PDT by cogitator
Thin Polar Bears Called Sign of Global Warming
WASHINGTON, DC, May 16, 2002 (ENS) - Hungry polar bears are one of the early signs that global warming is impacting Arctic habitat, suggests a new study from World Wildlife Fund. The report reviews the threats faced by the world's 22,000 polar bears and highlights growing evidence that human induced climate change is the number one long term threat to the survival of the world's largest land based carnivores.
Global warming threatens to destroy critical polar bear habitat, charges the report, "Polar Bears at Risk." The burning of coal and other fuels emits carbon dioxide (CO2) and other gases that blanket the earth, trap in heat and cause global warming.
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), climate change in the polar region is expected to be the greatest of anywhere on Earth.
"The WWF report shows that polar bears in Hudson Bay are being impacted by climate change," said Lynn Rosentrater, coauthor of the report and climate scientist at the World Wildlife Fund's (WWF) Arctic program. "The polar bear's basis for survival is being threatened by the reduction of the sea ice."
"Since the sea ice is melting earlier in the spring, polar bears move to land earlier without having developed as much fat reserves to survive the ice free season," Rosentrater explained. "They are skinny bears by the end of summer, which in the worst case can affect their ability to reproduce."
Increasing CO2 emissions have caused Arctic temperatures to rise by five degrees Celsius over the past 100 years, and the extent of sea ice has decreased by six percent over the past 20 years. By around 2050, scientists now predict a 60 percent loss of summer sea ice, which would more than double the summer ice free season from 60 to 150 days.
Sea ice is critical to polar bears' survival because it is the platform from where they hunt their primary prey - ringed seals and bearded seals. Diminishing ice cover and longer ice free periods limit the time the bears have on the ice to hunt and means that they have fewer fat resources to survive during the longer summer season.
Lower body weight also reduces female bears' ability to lactate, leading to fewer surviving cubs. Already, fewer than 44 percent of cubs now survive the ice free season.
As early as 1999, Canadian researchers noticed that polar bears in the Hudson Bay region were having trouble finding enough seals to eat due to the earlier breakup of sea ice. The scientists from the Canadian Wildlife Service found that weight for both male and female polar bears was declining, and female bears were having fewer cubs.
The impacts of global warming come on top of problems that polar bears already face from hunting, toxic pollution and oil development in the Arctic. The Arctic region is contaminated by pesticides and other chemicals carried by air and condensation from industrialized areas far to the south.
The pollutants enter the food chain, and animals at the top of the chain, such as polar bears, can carry tremendous body burdens of toxic chemicals. Research on polar bears has shown a link between high contaminant levels and reduced immune system function.
Due to the rapid pace of change in the Arctic, there is no time to lose in reducing emissions of greenhouse gases, WWF argues. The group says major reductions can be achieved by using existing technologies to increase the energy efficiency of homes, businesses and automobiles, and by using renewable energy sources instead of fossil fuels.
Bipartisan support has grown in Congress for a renewable portfolio standard that would ensure that 20 percent of U.S. energy comes from renewable energy by 2020. However, President George W. Bush has opposed the proposal.
World leaders will discuss a similar proposal at the World Summit for Sustainable Development in South Africa this summer. The WWF is calling on President Bush to support this initiative in Johannesburg.
"Arctic nations that are home to most of the world's polar bears should be leading the charge against global warming," said Jennifer Morgan, director of WWF's climate change program. "Instead, the United States - the world's largest global warming polluter - is essentially ignoring this problem. All eyes will be on President Bush at the upcoming World Summit on Sustainable Development in South Africa this August to test his commitment to sustainable energy solutions for climate change."
The WWF has created a new Web site: http://www.panda.org/polarbears with extensive information about polar bears and their Arctic domain. The site includes satellite tracking of two female bears, Louise and Gro, as they roam the ice pack in search of prey.
"Bones, perhaps we should acquaint the environmentalists
with the Heisenberg Clause of the Prime Directive."
Albedo(clouds & dust),
IR irradiation from surface absorbed in 1st hundred feet of atmosphere where it is predominately dissipated as kinetic energy.
Transport of heat from the surface to the upper atmosphere by convection dominated by
- N2 & H2 kinetic energy &
- water vapor(latent heat of vaporization/sublimation)
released radiant energy to stratosphere and on into space.
downward directed re-radiant IR is absorbed in the upper region of the atmosphere dissappated as kinetic energy not returning to the surface except by convection of cold air.
The role of CO2 is minimal by virtue of the near total absorption of IR in a very short path of troposphere. Adding more CO2 does not increase the capacity of air to absorb more IR at CO2 wavelengths, its just more molecules in the mass, same is true of NH4 & CFC's. Watervapor(latent heat), N2 & O2 kinetic energy are the dominant and overwhealming factors transporting heat from the surface to the statosphere where re-radiative loss becomes the dominant transport to space.
The main reason that I'm responding to this is that your original contention was this:
I find it interesting that out of all the range provided, the GW folks never present or even apparently consider the possibility that global climate temperatures can fall as well as rise. This is a telling note. They appear to be totally dedicated to demonstrating rising global temperture inspite of historical evidence that climates tempertures make excursions downward even with atmospheric CO2 concentrations much higher than even those assumed doublings of IPCC's GCM story lines.
Of all the mechanisms that you propose above, the only one that is capable of producing a significant global cooling is a change in albedo. As we've mentioned Mt. Pinatubo, an additional short-term mechanism is blocking of incoming solar radiation by atmospheric (volcanic, in this case) aerosols.
The significant global cooling mechanisms are those which substantially alter the Earth's radiation budget. Milankovitch forcing is therefore climatically significant because it's directly responsible for changes in the amount of solar insolation. Obviously, if the Sun's energy output was to decrease, that too would result in reduced insolation and therefore cooling. The most-commonly-held explanation for the "Little Ice Age" was a decrease in solar output during the Maunder sunspot minimum, and thus there was no Earth-based cooling mechanism. (I will note from a brief perusal of abstracts of the AGU Spring meeting, where I found the Wentz and Schabel MSU data re-analysis papers, indicates that the Maunder Minimum - LIA cause-effect relationship is not community consensus.)
A lot of people ask about the Ice Age - CO2 relationship. It appears that CO2 acts as a thermostat, but it is not the cause of major warming or cooling trends: insolation is. Once there has been a climatic shift, however, either elevated or reduced atmospheric CO2 concentrations act to maintain either a cold or warm climate, and cause 'resistance' to internal global temperature shifts. This is augmented by oceanic feedbacks, specifically iron input to the ocean via continental dust transport.
As an aside, it's interesting to me that we have different perspectives. My dalliance in geochemistry allowed me to see "beyond" chemistry; climate, specifically paleoclimate, shows the interaction and complexity of Earth's physical processes.
Please comment on:
6.5.3. deltaF-deltaC relationships
and
IPCC Observations of Greenhouse Gas and Radiative Forcing Changes since 1750
In the latter, particularly note the summary entitled "Radiative Forcing".
So, if you've got GHG-induced warming, and a water vapor feedback, then that's pretty much in-line with the mainstream view
Which leads us to one of many fallacies of the GCM theories. Water Vapor is a GHG and a least 2 orders of magnitude more effective than CO2.
Perhaps you will be kind enough to explain the difference between the GHG H20, and the GHG CO2, that one is called (only by IPCC & their modellers) a "feedback".
Water Vapor Rules the Greenhouse
I know enough to say this: temperature is a measurement of the kinetic energy of the molecules in a gas, liquid, or solid. Right?
Sounds good, now how does CO2 contribute to temperature increase if it only absorbs and re-radiates quantum 15micron IR radation,(i.e. a delayed spontaneous & random process). Hint, it can't, It must lose the absorbed IR excitation in collisions with other molecules to manifest as a change in temperature(i.e. velocity of molecules).
So first you've said that the stratosphere is too thin to absorb radiant energy,
I said that in comparison with the troposphere that is quite true.. Obviously there are molecules in the stratosphere, sparce though they may be compared to the troposphere, and thus can manifest temperature(i.e. molecular motion), black body radiation is radiated consequent to molecular changes in motion. Radiant energy absorption on the otherhand is a quantum process that occurs at very select wavelengths dependent upon the quantum characteristics of the molecules absorbing radiant energy.
Here is a more complete picture of radiation absorption from UV through Visible to Far Infrared in comparison with Solar & Earth blackbody radiation curves.
Note the only significant CO2 absorption of Earth blackbody radiation associated with the greenhouse effect is at the 15micron band overlapped by H2O rotational absorption which aborbs 100% of earth blackbody radiation at IR wavelengths greater than 15microns.
At 15micons, absorption is 100%, and as Hug & Barret have made clear, that absorption reaches extinction in a very short atmospheric path(<100ft) near the surface of the earth.
The statosphere loses heat to space, and it is too thin to absorb radiant energy released from blackbody radiation and from release of latent heat of water vapor transported to the upper atmosphere.
and then you note that it isn't, i.e., the injected aerosols impart a warming via greater molecular motion.
The injected aerosols themselves are molecules absorbing solar radiation as well as upwelling blackbody radiation and imparting any absorbed energy to the stratosphere in collisions with upper atmosphere molecules. So where is any inconsistency? Those "volcanic" areosols are only sporadically part of the picture.
By the way, blackbody radiation is predominately due to changes in motion of molecules in interaction and collision as opposed to the spontaneous quantum emmissions at specific wavelengths of non-interacting molecules.
So, if you've got GHG-induced warming, and a water vapor feedback,
Water vapor "feedback", is an IPCC fiction. Water vapor IS the dominant GHG.
You have solar induced changes, and water vapor GHG interactions.
Your major contention is still with the CO2 energy absorption.
Have I ever said otherwise? The contention of the IPCC & their modellers is CO2 is the king and driver of the whole show. Which is a blatant fiction.
I hadn't thought of extending Heisenberg Principal to Global Warmingtm even though it should have been obvious.
Global Warming caused by temperature measurements!
Pretty much sums up the entire article as a bodacious quantity of bovine fecal matter.
6.5.1. Factors Affecting Greenhouse Radiative Forcing
A number of basic factors affect the behaviour of different greenhouse gases as forcing agents within the climate system (Shine et al., 1990). First, the absorption strength and wavelength of the absorption in the thermal infrared are of fundamental importance in dictating whether a molecule can be an important greenhouse forcing agent; this effect is modified by the overlap between the absorption bands and those of other gases present in the atmosphere. For example, the natural quantities of CO2 are so large (compared to other trace gases) that the atmosphere is very opaque over short distance at the centre of its 15mm absorption band. The addition of a small amount of gas capable of absorbing at this wavelength has negligible effect on the net radiative flux at the tropopause.
Also the equation:
DF = 6.3 ln (C/C0) [Equation 19]
provided is empiricaly derived from justifying the IPCC models to adjust model outputs to reflect the contaminated surface temperature series, not from the basic physics of CO2 IR absorption characteristics.
Show me a derivation based in an actual controlled experiment backed up by physics not an equation reflecting the average of several incomplete and severly inadequate Global Climate models.
In the latter, particularly note the summary entitled "Radiative Forcing".
IPCC is known as much for what it doesn't say and leaves out than what it does.
1) Natural CO2 levels tend to follow, temperature change, they do not lead temperature. (due to release of CO2 from hydrates & dissolved CO2 in the oceans, increasing biomass, etc.) CO2 is an effect of temperature excursions in the atmosphere not a cause of such.
2) Much higher global temperatures with lower CO2 concentrations have existed in the past. CO2 concentration is poorly correlated with decadal & century changes in the climate.
Merely calling CO2 is a radiative forcing agent in a model does not make it a cause of global temperature change manifested in the physical world.
the only one that is capable of producing a significant global cooling is a change in albedo.
You leave out long term solar irradiation changes which do have long term variations as well as the 100kyr orbital precession of muller, (though the latter induces a change in stratospheric cloud cover which is a change in aldebo).
Milankovitch forcing is therefore climatically significant because it's directly responsible for changes in the amount of solar insolation
Actually the theoritical Milankovitch forcing of eccentricty does not fit as well as that of orbital precession. Orbital precession accounts for the 100ky variation much better than Milankovitch, and does not suffer from several inconsistancies that arise under Milankovitch.
Read:
My dalliance in geochemistry allowed me to see "beyond" chemistry; climate, specifically paleoclimate, shows the interaction and complexity of Earth's physical processes.
Anyone who has dabbled in prospecting, fossil collecting and rockhounding has that perspective, that along with astronomy, is what captured my interest in the sciences in my younger years under the influence of my grandfather & uncles.
My perspectives are much broader than the bare bones of what I have stated in this forum, most of which I prefer not to mention, but rather allow papers and substantive articles of others in the academic community to speak for me. It is useless for an internet personality to claim any credential and expect it to mean anything.
The web, I find, is a great leveler where ideas have to stand on their own more than on the personality or credentials of the speaker.
The Greenland study is for only one glacier and is not a global indicator.
Being subjected to that kind of stress would cause any organism to lose weight.
Do you think the bears share 'alien abduction' stories? These bears are probably depressed, demoralized, and disenchanted after being messed with so much.
From all the Cokes these bears drink, you'd think they would put on a few pounds.
"By contrast, if melting ice caps dilute the salt content of the sea, major ocean currents like the Gulf Stream could slow or even stop, and so would their warming effects on northern regions. More snowfall reflecting more sunlight back into space could actually cause a net cooling. Global warming could, paradoxically, throw the planet into another ice age."
Tnanks for the information. As I noted, a meeting presentation is not a published paper. It was primarily of interest because it was from Wentz and Co., which is not a fly-by-night group. We'll have to see what happens. When Wentz and Schabel first suggested the orbital decay correction, Spencer and Christy said it didn't make any difference -- they they proceeded to reanalyze their whole dataset because of the problem that Wentz and Schabel had found.
I'll bet part of the reason that scientists present papers at these meetings is to get an idea of what questions reviewers would ask before they actually submit a paper.
Never said that they did. But I think you would probably concede that the response glaciers will have some lag time. I would propose (hoping that an actual researcher might follow up) that the glaciers are now responding to the accelerated warming that has been noted in the surface record since about 1980. I would also propose that the Braithwaite study, because if covers a 1945-1995, is going to be weighted heavily for the no-trend period, so any trend appearing near the end of the record will be hard to detect.
The Greenland study is for only one glacier and is not a global indicator.
It's the second largest ice cap in the world and it's in the high Arctic, where global warming models say the warming will be most intense. I think it bears watching. NASA is set to launch a laser altimeter satellite (Icesat) at the end of the year that is designed primarily to measure ice cap volume and changes. So we'll only have to wait 5 years or so for enough data to indicate a trend... (yawn)
OK. Comment on the following with respect to your position (i.e., do the following articles lend support or not to your arguments):
Borehole temperatures and past climates
Brief Introduction to the Geothermal Approach of Climate Reconstruction
Yes, It Has Warmed Over the Past Five Centuries
(And don't forget to note the source of the last two articles.)
My "dalliance in geochemistry" means that I took a few grad-level courses in geochemistry and geophysics. I might've switched from my failed Ph.D. program in chemistry over to geochemistry, but I realized I liked making a living doing something relatively easy too much.
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