Wasn't clear to me if 2015 would have been hotter than 2014 had it not been an El Niño year.
2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record
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Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record
#22Okay - help someone that doesn't truly understand this. Earth's surface can gain heat through 4 ways I can think of (and this is just what I can think of and is likely wrong): 1) Geothermal brings more heat from core/mantle up. I don't think this is currently any larger than normal, nor do I imagine this varies much. 2) Oceans can give up heat they are storing and provide it on the surface. I don't know if El Nino is…
[not an expert] What you say is mostly correct. Two things though I think are critical and under-appreciated in understanding climate change:
1) rate of change & sixth mass extinction - many natural systems can adapt to gradual change over the course of many millennia but cannot to the incredibly rapid change our planet is now undergoing. this leads to loss of ecosystems & biomass which help to regulate our climate/CO2 levels
2) positive feedback loops - many systems are also at risk of destabilizing feedback loops, e.g melting ice increasing solar radiation absorption, ice sheets whose disintegration will accelerate with rising and warming oceans warming them from frontally and from below and moulins turning them into swiss cheese, potential permafrost melting w/ massive methane outgassing, etc.
The combination of these effects mean this is not a simple "calories in/out" type calculation, but a complex system geared towards maintaining equilibrium, which as we rapidly push further and further out of that equilibrium will face rising risks of a highly nonlinear, rapid shift to a dramatically new equilibrium climate the likes of which our planet has not seen since well before the dawn of our species.
Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record
#23I live in one of those "Record Warmest" boxes, it really was hot during the past year. Its funny how people you would consider uneducated and poor in my country would understand that there is clearly something going wrong with the world around us, while some people with lots of money, influence and education choose to believe that this is all a conspiracy by a foreign government. It's just nuts, really, something is…
>> It's just nuts, really, something is terribly wrong with our world, and we need to fix it. You should probably start with developing countries like China and India. The US has been actively reducing its carbon footprint for a while now: Energy related carbon emissions in the United States declined by 12% between 2005 and 2012, back to a level not seen since 1994. Per capita emissions fell 17% over the same period,…
I agree that China and India need to reduce their emissions. But those don't seem like the US numbers we should actually be looking at. What are energy related carbon emission vs. total emissions? And what happened to US population over that period?
It would be helpful to have a number for total emissions.
Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record
#24Okay - help someone that doesn't truly understand this. Earth's surface can gain heat through 4 ways I can think of (and this is just what I can think of and is likely wrong): 1) Geothermal brings more heat from core/mantle up. I don't think this is currently any larger than normal, nor do I imagine this varies much. 2) Oceans can give up heat they are storing and provide it on the surface. I don't know if El Nino is…
The Earth can only "gain" heat through #3, solar radiation. The other 3 items you list can store and release heat at a later time, but they can not generate more heat than they already possess now. (This is not strictly true, conversion of mass to energy, e=mc^2, means that nuclear and fusion energy could create new heat at the expense of matter, but we generally assume that on planets, this is negligible.) So if peo…
>Geothermal energy was stored back during the formation of the planet
"Nuclear Fission Confirmed as Source of More than Half of Earth's Heat"
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/nuclear-fis...
Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record
#25It sounds bad but I'm very unoptomistic about our chances of stopping this. There is just too much pollution and too little meaningful global cooperation. Just imagine if Trump did get into office as well...
IMHO the problem with stopping this and many other forms of environmental degradation is that it's better to reign in hell than serve in heaven so to speak.
Poverty is worse than all but the most severe natural disasters. Infant mortality in many poor countries is probably a lot higher than it is in Miami during a hurricane. Poverty is worse than pollution or storms. Even if the sea level rises it would be better to be forced to uproot cities and move them inland than it would be to go without modern sanitation, health care, food availability, education, etc. Only acute natural disasters like severe earthquakes and tornadoes approach chronic poverty in their destructive power.
As a result it is in the self-interest of everyone on Earth to prioritize some level of wealth -- say the achievement of a basic first-world middle class standard of living -- over any environmental problem save the most immediate, acute, and apocalyptic. That's why the response of the developing world to suggestions like CO2 reduction or limiting overfishing has so far been "screw you, we're poor."
This is also why I really think that what I call "abstinence based solutions" to these problems are dead on arrival. Telling people to forego the benefits of energy consumption or modern technology is like telling teenagers not to have sex. The only hope we have is to develop the world to the point that people can afford the luxury of caring about the future beyond the next 48 hours. Only then will we be able to transition to anything more sustainable. Desperate people can't afford to care. It's also a total non-starter to try to sell first world people on regressing their standard of living. They're not stupid.
Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record
#26If this keeps up, I have no idea how countries are going to deal with displaced migrants. We barely have the capability right now to properly deal with Syrians and African refugees.
Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record
#27I live in one of those "Record Warmest" boxes, it really was hot during the past year. Its funny how people you would consider uneducated and poor in my country would understand that there is clearly something going wrong with the world around us, while some people with lots of money, influence and education choose to believe that this is all a conspiracy by a foreign government. It's just nuts, really, something is…
>> It's just nuts, really, something is terribly wrong with our world, and we need to fix it. You should probably start with developing countries like China and India. The US has been actively reducing its carbon footprint for a while now: Energy related carbon emissions in the United States declined by 12% between 2005 and 2012, back to a level not seen since 1994. Per capita emissions fell 17% over the same period,…
Per-capita CO2 emissions by countries, 2011:
US 17.0t
China 6.7t
India 1.7t
Source: http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EN.ATM.CO2E.PC?order=wba...
Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record
#28I live in one of those "Record Warmest" boxes, it really was hot during the past year. Its funny how people you would consider uneducated and poor in my country would understand that there is clearly something going wrong with the world around us, while some people with lots of money, influence and education choose to believe that this is all a conspiracy by a foreign government. It's just nuts, really, something is…
>> It's just nuts, really, something is terribly wrong with our world, and we need to fix it. You should probably start with developing countries like China and India. The US has been actively reducing its carbon footprint for a while now: Energy related carbon emissions in the United States declined by 12% between 2005 and 2012, back to a level not seen since 1994. Per capita emissions fell 17% over the same period,…
And to whom do you think the Chinese and Indians are selling all the products of their export oriented industries?
Or for the matter, where do you think all the American safe, high-paying, manufacturing jobs went?
Outsourcing to a hitman does not make it a non-murder.
Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record
#29If this keeps up, I have no idea how countries are going to deal with displaced migrants. We barely have the capability right now to properly deal with Syrians and African refugees.
There's lot of room in Canada. Warm it up and it makes great farmland - there is plenty of freshwater nearby.
Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or, he could be observing that there were noticeably more noticeably hotter days last summer.
The problem is extrapolating from local weather to "climate change is real!" or "climate change is a lie!" We mock idiotic politicians who use snowstorms to "debunk" global warming; we should hold the other side to the same standard.
There's a difference.
Of course, if someone says "My country was so hot last year, this proves global warming!" then it's BS. On the other hand, since we know that global warming is happening, it's totally legitimate to say "My country was so hot last year, it sucked, and thanks to Global Warming we can expect more such years to come in the future. Why aren't we doing anything about it?"