Posted on 11/21/2006 6:09:56 AM PST by presidio9
There are signs that key U.S. officials are ready to take on global warming, even as much of the world community failed to show its will to deal with the impending threat at a recent global conference.
Despite intense calls for new and radical actions, last week delegates at the UN-sponsored meeting in Kenya agreed on many outstanding issues, but not on further cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.
Environmental groups widely described the outcome as a failure, but not all were expressing despair. Though equally unhappy with the results, some believe that meaningful global action on climate change is not a distant possibility.
Come January, those in the world who are concerned about the slow pace of climate action could see the global response get a boost with the United States becoming a significant part of it, according to an environmental group that is part of the global campaign for a swift response to global warming.
"With Democrats in control of both houses of Congress, changes in the federal policy are to be expected," said Gary Cook, director of the Climate Action Network, an umbrella organization representing over 350 environmental organizations worldwide.
Cook and his colleagues hope that with environmentally conscious Democratic lawmakers holding key positions in the Senate, the United States will soon be making real progress in reducing its greenhouse gas emissions, as well as moving the global agenda on climate change forward.
The 1997 Kyoto treaty requires as many as 35 industrialized countries to cut emissions by an average of 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2012. The United States is not obligated to abide by the treaty because the George W. Bush administration does not recognize it.
The Bush administration rejected Kyoto in 2001, arguing that it would harm the U.S. economy and that it should have also required reductions by poor but fast growing economies, such as India and China. Bush also repeatedly has said that more research was needed into the science of climate change.
The United States is responsible for about 25 percent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, although its share in the global population is just 5 percent.
Recent statements from Democratic Party leaders regarding appointments of lawmakers in the House and Senate bodies suggest that the analysis by environmentalists such as Cook could prove correct.
Last week, for example, three Democratic senators who are likely to head committees dealing with environmental issues wrote to Bush urging him to push for mandatory federal limits on greenhouse gases.
"The recent elections have signaled a need to change direction in many areas including global warming," they said in a letter telling the U.S. president that voters want the government to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Those who signed the letter included Barbara Boxer of California, Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico, and Joe Lieberman of Connecticut. The three are likely to head the Senate's environment, energy, and homeland security bodies, respectively, when Democrats assume leadership positions in January.
Boxer, who has introduced legislation that would mandate an 80-percent cut in U.S. emissions by 2050, has publicly declared that her committee's first hearing will be focused on global warming.
Like Boxer, Bingaman is considered a staunch supporter of action on climate change. In fact, he was the only member of Congress to attend last year's UN climate negotiations in Montreal.
"We pledge to work to pass an effective system of mandatory limits on greenhouses gases," Boxer and her colleagues told Bush in their letter. "We urge you to work with us...to signal to the world that global warming legislation is on the way."
Supporters for action on climate change say that since the November 7 elections new opportunities have arisen for Democratic politicians to take effective actions on the state level, and that in many areas, indications are that they are willing to do so.
While the most populous state of California has already embraced a climate action plan, Massachusetts' Democratic governor-elect Duval Patrick has expressed his willingness to align his state with a regional greenhouse gas initiative comprising seven other northeastern U.S. states.
Moreover, in recent polls, voters in Washington state joined more than 20 other pro-alternative energy states by approving a ballot initiative requiring 15 percent of the state's electricity to come from renewable sources.
In Nairobi, while delegates failed to set a deadline for concluding international negotiations on further cuts in emissions beyond 2012, they did agree to continue their discussions in the future.
As the next round of international talks takes place in Bali, Indonesia, in 2008, proponents of strong action against global warming say they hope that by then the United States may be in position to play an effective role in taking the world in a more positive direction.
On the domestic front, when the new Congress assumes its responsibility in January, it will have to deal with a number of ambitious bills to support alternative energy production and limit greenhouse gas emissions that were introduced this year.
Activists say they want the new Congress to adopt these and other aggressive measures on climate change proposals without any delay.
"That is the way the U.S. can begin to make real progress in reducing its emissions," said Cook.
No -- just convection! If you take a cold glass of iced tea out on the porch on a hot summer day, what happens to the temperature of the iced tea? (It doesn't happen because the sun is shining on the glass of tea!)
The oceans are a lot more complex than that; they give up heat in certain areas and absorb it elsewhere (tropics), but the atmospheric temperature is what determines the oceanic temperature.
The marketplace will decide based on cost effectiveness, but the federal government can certainly provide R&D incentives.
I say admiringly that you have a fairly bulletproof position. If you and I were alive at the turn of the next century, and if the global temperature is 3 deg. C higher, with ecosystems collapsing planet-wide and the Greenland ice sheet half melted away, you could still say "I'm still pretty worried about the next continental glaciation! We'd better keep pumping CO2 into the atmosphere to ward that off!"
IF there is a potential abrupt transition into the next glaciation that would happen, caused by undefinable trigger points, being concerned about when it will happen is about as useful as being concerned about when the Yellowstone caldera will erupt again. Sure it's useful to examine what might cause it -- but someone is going to have to pony up some pretty impressive evidence that 10 generations removed have to worry about it happening before 500 years have passed.
High: 57 degrees Fahrenheit. Low: 27 degrees Fahrenheit.
I can be more specific if you indicate what week you're interested in (1st, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th week of May).
High: 61 degrees Fahrenheit. Low: 37 degrees Fahrenheit.
Sorry for any confusion.
You might be missing a rather large source of incident energy.
Surface IR? Only through absorption by stuff in the water column, I think (I may not be following your meaning here).
What is by far the largest source of incident energy? That's your last hint. Miss this one and you get an F.
Well, the simplistic answer is the Sun. Sea ice is apparently affected by increasing downward longwave radiation, but the warming of the oceans is still primarily caused by energy flux from the atmosphere.
You need to learn more about physics - quantum mechanics, etc. I'd also recommend a course in heat flow.
The real answer is, the greatest energy flux into the oceans is from the higher frequency light spectrum, mainly vis and UV. Has to do with the attenuation factor of water versus wavelength. IR only penetrates just beneath the surface (a few microns to one centimeter, for all intents and purposes). That quickly mixes out into the near surface layer. There is very little heat moving past the thermocline. Most transport of the minor increase in energy from IR is lateral and even back into the air (especially given turbulance, waves, wind fetch, etc). UV and vis penetrate from 1 to a couple hundred feet (depending on turbidity). As goes the incident flux of such spectral bands, goes the heat content of the water.
I don't see a problem with that. But the reason that the oceans get warmer as the globe (atmosphere/surface) gets warmer is not primarily due to surface irradiance. Give me a couple of days to illustrate my point.
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