Rising ocean temperatures near worst-case predictions

[denem]

Source: WAtoday (Australia)

The ocean is warming about 50 per cent faster than reported two years ago, according to an update of the latest climate science.

A report compiling research presented at a science congress in Copenhagen in March says recent observations are near the worst-case predictions of the 2007 report by the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

In the case of sea-level rise, it is happening at an even greater rate than projected - largely due to rising ocean temperatures causing thermal expansion of seawater.

Released last night at the European Policy Centre in Brussels, the report says ocean temperatures are a better indicator of global warming than air temperature as the ocean stores more heat and responds more slowly to change.

Read more: http://www.watoday.com.au/environment/rising-ocean-temperatures-near-worstcase-predictions-20090619-cmtn.html

---

Every revision since the IPCC report on global warming has been revised up, as far as I can recall. What these studies are not saying is more even important:

"Quietly in public, loudly in private, climate scientists everywhere are saying the same thing: it's over. The years in which more than 2C of global warming could have been prevented have passed, the opportunities squandered by denial and delay. On current trajectories we'll be lucky to get away with 4C. Mitigation (limiting greenhouse gas pollution) has failed; now we must adapt to what nature sends our way. If we can.

This, at any rate, was the repeated whisper at the climate change conference in Copenhagen last week. It's more or less what Bob Watson, the environment department's chief scientific adviser, has been telling the British government. It is the obvious if unspoken conclusion of scores of scientific papers."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/mar/17/monbiot-copenhagen-emission-cuts

[SpiralHawk]

1. "Just more lib-rul fact-based reality. Pay no attention." - Rush 'DraftDodger' Limbaugh

"How are we republicons going to make Massive Profits if we pay attention to facts? Just move along, there's nothing to see here. Smirk."

- Rush 'DraftDodger' Limbaugh (R - Propagandist)

[Octafish]

7. It's no accident. Climage change is class war in another grotesque form. And the rich win.

These turds want environmental catastrophe.
The rich will be able to afford relocation and rebuilding.
The poor will starve and kill each other fighting for the scraps.
Thus, depopulating the planet is the ultimate capitalistic survival of the fittest.
Best for the monied class, it's cheaper than the alternative -- paying for solutions.

PS: Imagine how much we could do were we to have used the money lost in Iraq and AfPak on R&D for solving the apparent coming environmental collapse? Atmospheric CO2 scrubbers...Desalination systems for everybody...Shelved fossil fuels...

PPS: No. We got to have war. And tax cuts for the rich.

[glitch]

17. The winners will be very happy living in caves, eating spirulina, guaranteeing the pure white skin

of their progeny for millenia to come. Maybe with a translucent, greenish tinge. Perfection! :evilgrin:

[Winterblues]

21. I suspect for mankind there will be no millenia to come.

It is a bit more serious than people seem to believe.

[glitch]

22. I suspect you are correct, but I am trying to not to be too big a pessimist.

(I don't always succeed!)
I think pessimism discourages action and I do think we need to keep bailing, even while the ship goes down. And maybe some clever darling will fix the whole in the hull. Hey, it could happen. In an infinite universe the billions to one prospect comes through somewhere. Could be here. :hug:

[Birthmark]

23. Don't be too sure that the rich want catastrophe.

If we look at what happened as a result of the Plague in Europe, we find it actually worked out pretty well for the peasants.

http://www.brown.edu/Departments/Italian_Studies/dweb/plague/effects/soc_econ_effects.shtml

I think the reluctance of the rich to address the AGW problem has far, far more to do with the money that they are raking in now than it does with anything about the future.

[Zhade]

47. I for one look forward to the greedy rich being ripped apart by mobs.

And no, I am NOT being sarcastic. Fuck 'em.

[hunter]

37. Myanmar -- or New Orleans to a lesser but equally evil extent.

Seal the poor in and let them fend for themselves.

The privilged and powerful few have already demonstrated their long term plans for climate change.

[Soylent Brice]

2. K&R

[Birthmark]

3. That's the reluctant conclusion that I've come to as well.

These really forced me to that conclusion:

http://climateprogress.org/2008/12/21/hadley-study-warns-of-catastrophic-5%C2%B0c-warming-by-2100-on-current-emissions-path/

http://climateprogress.org/2009/02/23/mit-doubles-global-warming-projections/

I sincerely doubt that humanity will do anything to prevent the scenarios in the links above from coming to pass. I hope that I'm wrong...but I'm planning as if I'm right.

[DainBramaged]

4. And unfortunately, WE are powerless to effect any change

Reality, it's what pisses people off.

[denem]

5. While our 'leaders' talk on about +2C

as if THAT'S a good thing :(

[Birthmark]

6. It's funny, isn't it?

"Honey, I ran over the dog. But don't worry, I didn't kill him. He's only paralyzed. Ain't I GREAT?"

[denem]

8. Gallows humor,

:shrug:

[Ilovevermont]

9. Grim as the news may be,

this is not a time for sitting by and doing nothing. Of all
the issues facing us today, this is the one that should have
us in the streets (if some of us don't already live there).
Anyway, God bless Greenpeace and also Bill McKibben and all of
the others who are putting their bodies on the line to try to
wake up our dear leaders. 
For those of us who have children, grandchildren, even
greatgrandchildren, we know we cannot quit. There are many
ways to remain in denial, but we must not permit those who
hold the power to continue on this path. I have recently
learned about 350.org, based on the idea that we must quickly
reduce our carbon output to 350 ppm, instead of the current
more than 380 ppm. Even this doesn't address the other serious
greenhouse gas, methane, much of it from factory farming and
natural gas drilling. We have to push for our country to do
better at Copenhagen than we are doing with passing the
woefully inadequeate Waxman bill. Even the deluded wealthy
cannot survive on an inhospitable planet. Jobs will not save
the planet, only the good work of bringing us back into the
realization that we are part of the natural world and that we
must share with all of our brothers and sisters. In the long
run, banks and money are useless, and as a Creek medicine man
said, "What are you going to do when Mother will no
longer give - eat your money?

[denem]

10. Failure is not an option, but cap and trade is a farce.

Cap and trade is little better than exchanging baseball memorabilia aboard the Hindenburg,

[glitch]

20. Welcome to DU! You are correct of course, even if we don't make it we have to go down trying.

For the sake of the children and grandchildren the assumption must be that we will make it, but that it is going to be hard work and will require actual courage.
Those skills need to be taught.

[GliderGuider]

38. I worry that if we go down trying...

we will take many species along with us that didn't want to come but had no choice in the matter.

"Trying" got us into this mess. Will more trying get us out? There are days I have my doubts. There are days that I look at the mess we've made and wonder if we're really special enough to save.

[glitch]

40. I don't think "trying" got us into this mess. I think "denying" got us into this mess

We haven't even begun to try, perhaps we never will.
And trying to save humans is only part of the "going down trying", not even the major part, trying to design a system where all species survive (not just survive but survive beautifully) is the true major part of the "going down trying". If I had my way anyway.

At this point if we don't try permian level extinction is most likely. The arctic is already melting, we've most likely already entered the accelerated feedback loop. Even if we stopped adding co2 and methane to the atmosphere tomorrow we'd still warm another 2 degrees from the processes already initiated.

Dynamic systems don't have an on/off switch, if we were to disappear tomorrow our planet would still have a rough time adapting to what we have initiated. Probably a better chance than if we actually tried to solve the problem but not certainly. Definitely certainly if we continue to not try at all, or try in baby steps out of cowardice which is unconscionable.

Still, "Save Despair for Better Times" (graffiti from a wall in IIRC Argentina during their economic collapse).

[Odin2005]

11. This is not good at all. And that's putting it mildly.

We need to seriously look at climate engineering proposals. If China and India refuse to play ball it will be the only option in any case.

[Javaman]

12. 4C is a game ender. It's been nice knowing you all!

Well, at my age, I'll be lucky to make it to mid century.
I worry about my wifes kids and their kids. The future they will experience scares the living crap out of me.
I have been trying to teach them basic survival skills such as finding water, etc.
Trying my best to pass on my knowledge of gardening.
I'm slowly compiling a knowledge base of information in a 3 ring binder to pass on. I think it will be more like a multi-volume deal.

[denem]

13. 4C / 7F Wont kill the earth, but

it will cull it's most ferocious predator. Us

[Javaman]

14. What I mean by game ender...

is the end of what we currently call civilization.

I see nomadic tribes again inhabiting most of the northern regions of the earth.

[denem]

16. I see rich people in big 'gated' communities.

Whether you'd call them civilized is another matter,.
As for the rest - who cares :sarcasm:

[glitch]

19. I think you're being optimistic.

When scientists start talking Permian level extinctions (90% of ALL life, big animals go first) we won't even be able to achieve soylent green level of community.

My only source of optimism lies in the fact that I could be wrong. Who knows, maybe the "little ice age" solar flare cycle will arrive in time to cool us off.

[Birthmark]

26. I doubt the Sun will bail us out of this

That is, unless it does something utterly unpredictable and previously unseen. We're just coming off the longest lack of sunspots since 1913, yet 2008 was *still* one of the ten warmest years on record.

But even if the Sun did give some temporary relief that CO2 is still there in the atmosphere. The moment the Sun returned to "normal" the heating would begin again.

[glitch]

28. I know.

I didn't say it was reasonable! :P

[Birthmark]

29. I get it.

I, too, welcome our carbon-sucking alien overlords. :toast:

[glitch]

31. Lol! Hey, if your species and 90% of your beloved planet faces imminent extinction

you gotta have a laugh now and then. Not that that means you shouldn't seriously work toward solving the "problem". Cheers. :toast:

[DKRC]

35. That sounds like paradise compared to the Venus syndrome

which is where we're probably heading with all the deniers & apocalypse worshipping nutjobs we have in positions of power.

Here’s what Jim Hansen had to say in his “Bjerknes Lecture” presentation at the American Geophysical Union on 17 December 2008:

“The Earth’s climate becomes more sensitive as it becomes very cold, when an amplifying feedback, the surface albedo, can cause a runaway snowball Earth, with ice and snow forming all the way to the equator. If the planet gets too warm, the water vapor feedback can cause a runaway greenhouse effect. The ocean boils into the atmosphere and life is extinguished.

The Earth has fell off the wagon several times in the cold direction, ice and snow reaching all the way to the equator. Earth can escape from snowball conditions because weathering slows down, and CO2 accumulates in the air until there is enough to melt the ice and snow rapidly, as the feedbacks work in the opposite direction. The last snowball Earth occurred about 640 million years ago.

Now the danger that we face is the Venus syndrome. There is no escape from the Venus Syndrome. Venus will never have oceans again. Given the solar constant that we have today, how large a forcing must be maintained to cause runaway global warming? Our model blows up before the oceans boil, but it suggests that perhaps runaway conditions could occur with added forcing as small as 10-20 W/m2.”

http://climateprogress.org/2008/12/21/hadley-study-warns-of-catastrophic-5%C2%B0c-warming-by-2100-on-current-emissions-path/

Edited: I need spell check for subject lines. :blush:

[denem]

42. The Venus syndrome apocalypse is nonsense. The earth has been +10C warmer

for most of life's history: Now a human apocalypse is a different story.

[Odin2005]

30. Here is what the climate was like the last time the earth was 4C warmer than now

I'm not liking the prospect of gators crawling around up here in Minnesota. :scared:

[glitch]

32. Not to mention ants, spiders, ticks, fleas, mosquitos, flies all carrying debilitating diseases

such as Lyme Disease and West Nile virus. Well, with the increase in reptiles perhaps we won't have to worry so much about the insects.
And by we I mean the MUCH smaller mammals who happen to survive the "Permian-level extinctions" threatening our future.

[dysfunctional press]

45. it's going to be an interesting ride.

we're preparing to hunker down and go communal. i am fairly certain that our home will be multi-generational/familial by the end of the year, and my wife and i have no kids- just an abundance of space, right now.

[DCKit]

15. Time to sell the condo in Miami and move back to Long Island.... oh shit. n/t

[mnhtnbb]

41. Better make that move to Peoria.

[MellowDem]

18. While I agree overall with the report...

the whole idea that we can predict at exactly what level of carbon dioxide we'd be "okay" with seems stupid. Obviously we want to limit it as much as possible, but the idea that there is a threshold we could've kept under and not have to adapt is simply not true. The idea that now we're screwed any more than we were before is counterproductive. We've been screwed all along, and they should go with that, but now we are trying to make sure we're not screwed to the point of extinction.

[Birthmark]

25. "What level of carbon dioxide we'd be "okay" with..."

...is based upon somewhat sound science. We know, within a range, what the climate sensitivity to CO2 is. So it's not a guess as to what will happen overall at various levels of atmospheric CO2.

[Selatius]

39. At 4C, that might push us to extinction. We were hoping to avoid that.

Anything above 2C, say, 4C or perhaps higher like 5C (they did say we would be lucky to get away with just 4C), would cause much larger disruption in climate the world over. We could deal with a smaller disruption, but the larger the disruption, the more difficult to deal with. At 4C, crops would fail. People would die of starvation. Rain might not come down in areas as once before, thus failure of crops, and areas where little rain comes down could receive a lot of rain. Oceans would rise threatening low-lying cities like New Orleans as glaciers and ice caps melt away. Warmer oceans would also mean more powerful hurricanes and the destruction they bring with them. Coastal cities not flooded would then be battered by these hurricanes.

This type of environment would lead to resource wars between nations and major population displacement. This would be a grim future, and if the scientists are right in saying we have screwed up and can now no longer avoid catastrophic warming, then it is game over for a lot of people and for a way of life we have come to be comfortable with. We will be forced to accept a much lower standard of living.

[yellowcanine]

24. But the deniers will still focus on the atmospheric temps and claim there is no warming - even

though it seems clear that the oceans are absorbing the excess heat.

[Psephos]

27. No mention of the incipient El Nino...

...which by definition is a rise in Pacific Ocean surface temperatures, and a thermal expansion.

El Nino is a cyclical product of the decadal oscillations of the big ocean basins, and by extension, of ocean-atmosphere coupling.

The article should have discussed this.

[ohio2007]

34. those things are inconvenient truths

and now that the sunspots have becme active again,
expect a spike in global warming talk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rj-4t9drUlM
Not much was made about the prediction that the arctic ocean was to be ice free in 2008 come to think of it.

[kestrel91316]

33. We need to rethink the calculus on climate change.

Changes are accelerating faster than "expected".

[XemaSab]

44. .

[jpak]

36. Deniers suck

Can I get an Amen!

:evilgrin:

[mnhtnbb]

43. Amen.

[DCBob]

46. It is unfortunate but the economy seems to be trumping the attention this issue deserves.

In fact, I am afraid it may already be too late. This needs immediate bold action but few are willing to do anything. I hope I am wrong but this is a major disaster coming to the whole world within the next decade or so.